


Pandora's Box

by yukine (orphan_account)



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Alternate Universe - Dystopia, Alternate Universe - Superheroes/Superpowers, Betrayal, Electrical Powers, Explicit Language, Explicit Sexual Content, Guns, Hatelationship, Humor, Jean and Marco as Enemies, M/M, Masturbation, implied eruri
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-05-09
Updated: 2014-09-28
Packaged: 2018-01-21 07:44:25
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 8
Words: 54,641
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1543037
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/yukine
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It’s a hard knock life for a guy like me. I come from a background of poverty and sickness. I can shoot lightning out of my hands, so the King automatically wants my head. Two old men who should be taking up crocheting instead of trying to overthrow the government are recruiting me to risk my life to go get some mythical Box that I’m not even sure exists.</p><p>And the freckled bastard of a royal guard who wants me dead is now my only chance of survival.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Old Men Need Better Hobbies Than Trying to Overthrow the Government

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I'm not supposed to exist, but I _am_ the best electrician you'll ever meet.

'Freak' is such a nasty word. 

Let me begin this story by saying that technically, there's nothing wrong with me. Nothing that I asked for, or that anyone else did, so I don't think it's fair to hold it against me. It's not like I had control over the reportedly (yet believably) unpleasant shock my mom received as she cradled her newborn baby boy in her arms for the first time, voice gentle and eyes shining with love, and reached down and the baby grasped her finger...causing a literal electric current to shoot through her body from the contact. All things considered though, if she had bothered to do a background check, she would've at least anticipated the possibility that I'd pop out into the world shooting lightning out of my hands and exploding the vase in the hospital room. My grandma on my dad's side could do the same thing, and apparently, it's recessive. 

Hi. My name is Jean Kirschtein, and the government likes to pretend I don't exist. 

To be honest, I owe my powers (other people call them powers, but since I've lived my entire life with them and they are totally normal for me, it's hard for me to consider them as such) to the fact that some time back in my family tree, I had a privileged as fuck ancestor who couldn't keep it in his pants. A hundred years ago, there were no walls dividing the world of which I live in. It was just one big, open space with Sina Palace right in the middle. And sure, there were social classes and richer areas and poorer areas, but nothing to the caliber of today. And just the same as now, the King would sit his fat ass down in some unnecessarily diamond-encrusted chair and eat buttered 24 karat gold or whatever for breakfast as guards would stand around and encircle the palace day and night to protect him like he was something worth protecting. Obviously, this is a shitty form of government, so people rightfully got mad. Attacks on the palace and assassination attempts became more common, and the guards- while superior in almost every way to the peasants trying to take them down- were still few a number to mobs of thousands. 

That's when the modifications started. 

The King grabbed a heaping of gold from out of his ass and commissioned the kingdom's scientists to work out something to help the guards protect him better. Give and take a couple years, and they whipped up this technology that all the guards were required to cycle through. Get strapped down on a table and let the scientists literally recode parts of your DNA, subtracting this, adding that, and they'd walk out of the room genetically enhanced human beings. The powers invested in them varied depending on the job- general security guards got their growth hormones whacked with and gained inhuman strength, wall guard's eyesight got sharpened to that of a hawk's and sense of smell to a dog's, and had been given flight suits with huge wings to help them lift off the ground and swoop down. But by far the most interesting of the guard's gifts were those given to the interior guards- the power to harness the great bolts of light that struck down from the Heavens, to control lightning with the wave of a hand. So with these modifications, rebels were in for a nasty surprise- they were crushed, dropped from the sky, and fried like chicken. Things were back to the way they were. ...But sometimes, when their shift was off, maybe a peasant girl would walk by a guard and give him a whole other sort of electric tingle. Guards would have illegal relationships under the cover of night with the lesser people, and not surprisingly, nine months later, there would be whole new bundles of joy popping into the world. This would've been fine a couple of years beforehand, as there would've been no way to prove a baby was a guard's. But the powers came from genetic modification. They were literally instilled into the guards' genes, which meant they could be inherited.  

And it's not so easy to say a guard had no making in an infant when it's electrocuting it's baby bottle. 

As one would imagine, the King was not pleased that his precious powered-up guards were breeding with common folk, and probably more than a little afraid- if peasants began having the same powers as those protecting him, who's to say their next uprising wouldn't be successful? So he hunted those of this new mixed race, of pure blooded guards and the dirty peasants they were birthed from, in fear of what would happen when they grew up. Most of them, he caught, and the history books kind of leave it there, although one can infer what happened to all those children that were and then suddenly weren't. But some of them were hidden. Some of them survived, and some even passed on the genes to children of their own. 

Walls were erected, three of them, 50 meters high each, dividing the world into thirds, with only the extremely rich and privileged, royalty, and guards living in Sina, which makes up the center of the circular wall complex. I'd never been there myself, I'd never had the chance, I'm not  _supposed_  to go, but it's common knowledge that it's paradise. It's the smallest area but it's clean and lavish and the streets and the streets are paved in gold and the sun always shines. It is, in a word, perfect. 

And then there's Rose and Maria. They're dirty and poverty-stricken and desperate. Sickness is abound and God have mercy when an epidemic sweeps through, infectious and deadly because  you're entrapped within walls and there's no way out. We can do nothing but rely on what little overpriced medicine Sina ships out, but more than less of the people can't afford it, anyway. Me? I live in the Trost District of Rose. Compared to most people here, I get along relatively well, I guess. I have a pretty solid job. I'm an electrician, officially, and I'm really good at it. It does help immensely that I can shoot electricity from my fingertips to do jobs. So to whoever my ancestor was that was too horny to not fuck the peasant girl, thanks, or something. 

'Course, some people really don't like me. I'm not supposed to exist. Everybody in Sina wanted the children of the guards dead, and others still see me as a freak of nature, but whatever. Life is good-ish. 

I never feel more alive than when I'm doing street shows. And that is where our story of the quest to get a hypothetical all-powerful cube and my complications with a freckled douche bag who was really quite opposed to the idea begins. 

* * *

I grinned as I surveyed the incoming crowd as I hopped from ball of foot to ball of foot, rubbing my hands together and blowing to get warmed up. I had a new routine I had been working on I was dying to show off. The crowd encircling me knew what was coming, of course. I recognized a few familiar faces of regulars who came to see my performances on a consistent basis. Mostly children, but a couple of teens and adults. My leather jacket's sleeves were pushed up to my elbows and my gray jeans clung tightly to my legs, but they're still plenty flexible enough for what I had coming. My red T-shirt peeked out from the unzipped half of my jacket, and my dog tags dangled around my neck. As always, I had a hat flipped upside down next to where I stood. After all, leaving some token showing that my performance was enjoyed was always thoroughly appreciated and highly encouraged. I looked up, squinting at the sky curtained in thick, blandly gray clouds. Overcast. Perfect. 

I turned my attention back to the spectators, beaming. "Ready?" I called out. A chorus of cheers replied. Alright. Good audience. Better give 'em the ol' razzle dazzle. I grinned and threw my hand skyward, feeling the familiar tingle begin to run up the inside of my veins. I breathed out slowly, snapped my elbow back and pushed it forward, and my hair blew back as a crack of blindingly bright electricity made a jagged pathway from my finger tips to the sky above. A great flash flickered in the belly of the cloud, and the rolling streak of light rapidly expanded to illuminate the undersides of the neighboring clouds, creating a network of lightning jumping from cloud to cloud. The crowd's heads were all tipped back as they "Ooh"ed and "Aah"ed in wonder, but to me, that's nothing. That's just the warm up. 

Their heads snapped back down as I curled my fingers and yanked downwards, and like a rewinded snake, the lightning was instantly recoiling back into my hand, as if it was a cord I had tossed into the air and pulled back down. I let the lightning surge back into me through my arm, which caused no harm to me. I'm a walking electric conductor, anyway. Once their attention was back to me, I sucked in a breath then suddenly sprung forward, feet leaving the ground to do a roll. I flipped around in my mid-air somersault, then landed in a perfect squat, slamming my palm into the ground to send lightning bolts flaring from my fingertips upwards. Acrobatics and lightning, the perfect crowd-pleasing combo. As expected, they went nuts with cheers, which left me with a satisfied grin on my face as I stood back up. I then decided to flip backwards, so I bent down to my haunches before bouncing back up, arms extending as I sailed back in the air, hands connecting to the ground. For half a second, I was in a handstand, then I kicked my feet back over my head- trailing lightning with them- as I bounded back in a double spring. I panted as I landed, but was pleased with the grace I had carried out the action with. It had taken me a while to perfect, after all. The crowd was rabid, fired up and enthralled as they watched me spin and twist and kick electricity out of my feet and palms. They better be. 

After a couple minutes of bouncing around, I felt the fatigue of what I was doing begin to press it's strain down on me, and I figured I had satisfied the crowd enough to bring my show to a close. So I landed back from the jump I was doing and grinned at them, asking if they wanted the grand finale. As one would expect, I was bombarded with overenthusiastic responses of agreement. As I damn right should've been. 

I nodded and stepped forward, causing the circle of people around me to step back. I sucked in a breath. The move I had in mind was cool in theory, but I had never actually done it before. ...Still though. I mean, how hard could it be? 

I whipped around and pointed at the ground in a spot diagonally right from me, then flicked my wrist to send a bright blue bolt streaking jaggedly from my fingertips and into the ground. Chunks of earth went flying, but I quickly snapped my arm so that I was pointing towards the sky, and the lightning followed- creating a column of sparking, blue light spiraling up into the clouds. Okay, good, I could do that. That was a thing I could do. Breathing out in relief, I whipped around to shoot three more around me, creating a square of lightning pillars surrounding me. The crowd had gone quiet with breathlessness and anticipation, so I grinned. I jumped into the air, twisted, and landed with my fist pounding into the ground- and the lightning ceased entirely. 

My chest heaved with heavy breaths, and I shakily raised myself on trembling legs to do a panorama of the hoard of people around me absolutely losing their fucking shit. Cool. 

Still panting, I tucked one arm to my front and one to my back as I dipped forward in a bow. Sweat dripped down my brow and contoured my cheek bones, and I unzipped my leather jacket a little bit to air myself out. The clapping was a well-deserved thunderous roar, and even more well-deserved were the coins dumped into the hat next to me. Each shiny circle of goodness tossed in was accompanied with a praiseful comment. "That was amazing!" "You're so cool!" "Thank you for that." "My son loves you." "You're so lucky to have such cool powers!" "Do you do birthday parties?" "That was awesome, thank you. All the best."  I nodded and politely smiled and thanked them, high fived a couple of little kids who came to see, and almost asked for this one cute chick's contact information but she was already gone. Ah, well.  

Once the crowd had dissipated and I was more or less alone again, I bent over to peer into my hat. It's contents glittered, and I beamed. I picked it up, pleasantly surprised at the weight it resisted with, then switched it to tightly clutch it in my hand as I checked the watch slapped on my other watch. 

Ah, fuck. My shift started and I was late. I groaned and wheeled around, and not surprisingly, there was a dude my age walking towards me, his dark brown hair falling into his turquois eyes. I sighed and stretched as he approached me, greeting him with a question. "...He's mad, isn't he?" 

"Pretty pissed," came the guy's reply. "That's the second time this week." 

I rolled my eyes, holding onto my hat of money tighter as I approached my unneeded escort. "Figures. Only sends you out when he is." 

We began walking down the street.  The guy shrugged. "Dunno. I think what you do is fine, but you fail to negotiate it with him ahead of time, so the times overlap and he gets worked up." 

"Yeah, well, he's always worked up, Eren." 

Eren frowned at me. "I guess. But he's...even more unhappy with knowing what you do, and especially mad over the fact that you have a client." 

I groaned. "Alright, fine. I should've been more mindful of the time. But it's not like he's gonna kick my ass out of the business." 

"I wouldn't push it," Eren quickly responded. "I mean, you're one of the best workers we have, yeah, but remember that's mostly because of your powers." 

"Hm." I opened my mouth to protest, then grinned and shrugged, figuring there was no use in denying his totally correct statement. "You know what? You're right. Past certain discrimination, life is way easier when you have powers. Knew a dude once who was related to one of the wall guards, got the powers. He's dumb as a brick but works with the police force of Rose because they use him like a slightly more intelligent bloodhound. Couple of friends of mine are heavyweight champions on the other side of town because they're descended from the exterior palace guards. This one time, I met a girl like me, with electric powers. Know what she does? Tattoo parlor, way off in the Karanese District. People dig the look of lightning tattoos. Ah, there you go, there's a backup. I could go into tattooing." 

"Powers aren't everything." 

I scowled. "No, but they're most things." I flicked his ear, and he cringed. "You wouldn't know, flea." 

Eren bent forward as if to give a snappy reply, but thought better of it and shook his head. "I'm just saying, powers won't get you out of trouble every time. If you keep being late, you'll probably lose the job. And there's gonna be situations where lightning won't help anything." 

If I had a coin for everytime I've gotten this speech from my mother, I'd be commissioning the construction workers to build me my own palace by now. I grunted with irritation and folded my arms, looking forward again. "Haven't had a situation yet. Takin' me to my next job or jabbering about my morals, Eren?"  

He glanced at me with frustration, then sighed. "Next job. Mister Dawk is already there with the client, so you should start coming up with an apology, and sooner than later."  

* * *

So, yeah, Nile Dawk wasn't pleased. 

He was rapidly apologizing to a customer, and when I walked in the room Eren had directed me to, he spun around with furrowed brows and I clenched my teeth as if bracing myself. I was in for it. "Where've you been?" barked my employer.  

I blinked at him, then slowly shifted the hat full of money behind my back. "...Uh." 

"You were doing a street show?" he yelled. "You're late because of that?" 

"I'm very, very sorry, sir, it won't happen again."  

"It keeps happening! Again and again!" he said angrily, gripping fistfuls of his hair. "Don't you know full-on displaying your powers like that is dangerous?" 

I quirked an eyebrow. "Sir, I see no harm in it. I apologize if this displeases you, but I've done it for a while, and they're kind of...what I use to work here, and-" 

"Fix the light, Kirschtein." Nile grunted and wheeled away from me, tensely gesturing to the light on the ceiling, already set up with a ladder underneath. I squinted at it and nodded, dipping my head at the customer before scrambling up the ladder, hearing the others leave as I stared at the bulb.  

As previously mentioned, Jean Kirschtein's the name, electrician is the game. (Was it totally cheating that I have nothing to offer to this job but the powers I was born with? Yes it was.) Eren is Nile's intern, so he runs out and does jobs for him- fetching me is one of them. He shares this job with his sister, a gorgeous woman I've been trying to hook up with named Mikasa, but she usually does more specialized tasks. A guy named Armin- who is descended from a wall guard- is the secretary, and I have a couple of co-workers I generally get along with. None of us particularly like working as electricians, but it's work. It puts food on the table and it had jobs available which is more than enough appeal for the poor, underfed people of Rose to flock to. Besides, my plans for the future were never "live rest of life shooting lightning into peoples' light bulbs". This is a temporary thing. And between working here and my street shows, all I want to do is save up enough money to buy my way into Sina. Once I do that, everything will be perfect. ...But that'd have to wait. 

From what I picked up, it was more than a simple bulb burn. The wires themselves seemed to not be functioning. That was easy, though. I had done this sort of thing a million times before. I hopped off the ladder and followed the cord, then ran my fingertips up a section of it, letting zaps of electricity flow through them. I glanced at the light. Still dead. I sighed, then continued my motions, and eventually, the light flickered to life. 

For just a single light blowing out, calling electricians didn't seem necessary. But then again, I remembered most people don't have more than two. 

Once it was all fixed up, I stood up and brushed my hands off, clapping them aimlessly as I looked around. The house was normal sized- and that is to say pretty damn tiny. I turned my head as Eren was suddenly hustling back in, eyes wide, a small slip of paper flapping in his hand. "Jean!" 

I frowned. "You're going to trip, and I'm going to laugh when that happens." 

He skidded to a stop in front of me, then held out his hand to me, flicking his wrist to call attention to the paper clutched in it. "Uh, note got dropped off to Mister Dawk for you. So I delivered it. I didn't read it or anything, by the way."  

I snatched the paper from his hand, glancing quizzically at him, then looked down as I unfolded it, eyes flicking over it to read the words scrawled in barely legible handwriting on the paper.  

 _It's us. We're back. We need to talk to you, so ~~get your ass over to~~   ~~move it to~~  goddammit meet us down in the usual spot at sundown.  ~~If you're a no show you've got another thing coming.~~_  

 _-LA and ES_  

Well. I could certainly tell which one of them was the one who wrote the note, and which one of them was editing it. Of course, I recognized the writers immediately, and I couldn't help but grin a little at the note.  

Ah. Old family friends, it's been too long. 

"...So, uh. Who are- who are LA and ES?" Eren's voice came wobbling out in front of me, and I raised my head.  

"Thanks for not reading the note, Eren." 

"It was handed to me." 

"For me." 

"Whatever." 

"Shut up." 

* * *

The underground pipes smelled foul, at best. Sticking your head into them is like walking into a wall of wet dog on moldy cement. They were damp and cold and dark and honest should've probably been a little less accessible than they really are. This is where rain water goes when it seeps through the drains- or at least, that was the purpose they were built for. But anything that goes down the storm drains ended up here, making it reek of a vile mixture of dirty water, gasoline, rotting food, and some more indistinguishable aromas that'd make the faint of heart pass out. An echo bounced around the space with the click of my feet stomping against the cement as I hopped off the ladder, grimacing. My nose scrunched up in disgust as my eyes flicking around the inside of the pipe, trying to adjust to the lack of light. They continued as far down as I could see in front of me and as far down as I could see behind me, too. How long is this pipe system? Nobody knows, nobody has ever actually been through the entire complex. It's tens of miles, at  _least._ Some construction workers say there are secret passages all over the place. Some that lead to Maria, some that lead to Sina, some that lead  _outside._ I don't know if that's true, and I wasn't dumb enough to risk getting lost forever in this fucking eternity complex of pipes just to see if I'll poke out in Maria.  

A murky-looking, shallow stream of water licked straight down the middle of the pipe and lapped at the bottoms of my combat boots. Gross. I stepped out of the rivulet of muck to walk over to the wall (if circular structures have walls) and waited. And waited. And glanced at my watch. And waited. I banged my head backwards against the stone, wincing. It was sundown, like the note had specified. Where were they?  

Slow but surely, the clip-clop, clip-clop of two pairs of out-of-sync footsteps came into audibility from somewhere down the pipes, advancing towards me. I raised my eyebrows and shoved my hands into my pockets, calling out to who I knew was concealed by the dark. "Wow. How about you pick a more suspicious place to carry out the meeting described in your non-ominous note of doom?" 

"It serves it's purpose," shot back a monotone voice, flat except for a slight tinge of ever-present irritation. 

I smiled, waiting for them to come close enough for us to be able to see each other. I rocked up on the balls of my feet and cheekily raised my eyebrows. "Gonna kidnap me or something, guys? Hold me for ransom? Better be at least minimum wage or I'll be offended."  

I heard a low chuckle simultaneous with a sharp grunt. "If we wanted to kidnap you, we would've done it when you were still in physical diapers, not just the metaphorical ones you never took off." 

I snorted, amused. "Says the dude who changed them." 

"And I've never done it since. Small humans are fucking gross." I very much had the right to tease these guys (mainly just the one). I'd known them quite literally my entire life. 

Into the thin string of light thrown down my the tight circle to the above world over my head I had entered through stepped two men, almost comical in physical difference. One a tall, muscular man with a strong jaw and defined cheeks, neatly combed butter blonde hair atop his head with dusky brown sideburns and underside. His hair was basically a cleaner and lighter recoloring of mine. To his right, at 5'3" of pure and condensed nightmare fuel, was another man, wisps of his short black hair framing his narrowed, sunken, and uncomfortably intense cobalt eyes. His mouth was a hard line and his overly pale skin practically glowed in the light. Their outfits didn't differ a lot from mine, but their coats were longer, and the shorter of the pair had on white gloves that clashed horridly with the rest of it, although I knew he didn't give a flying fuck. Neither looked much different than they did than when they were babysitting me when I was a slobbering infant. I dipped my head slightly in greeting. "Hey. 'S been a while."  

The blonde returned the gesture while the dark-haired man just glared. “Good evening, Jean,” came the deep-voiced blonde warmly. “You look well.” 

"I’m doing okay, yeah. You two, too." I swept my tongue tip over my cracked lips. "So. What lands us here in a restricted area at night to chat? Letters would smell a lot better." 

They exchanged uneasy looks. The dark-haired one turned back to me. “…We weren’t successful.” 

I sighed at that and folded my arms. “That’s why you pulled me over, Levi? To tell me Plan Destroy Everything was a no-go again?” 

Levi’s lip pulled back in annoyance and he leaned forward to snap at me, but the blonde held out his arm to block him. He gave Levi a warning stare before letting it calmly fall on me. “No. There’s more to it than that, or we wouldn’t have asked you to meet us.” 

“‘Plan Destroy Everything,’” muttered Levi, repeating my words with rising anger. 

I quirked an eyebrow then looked back at the blonde. “What’s up, Erwin? What do you need to tell me so important it needs to be underground?” 

Erwin lowered his arm and slipped his hands into his pocket. “…There’s no easy way to say this.” My eyes widened. Despite my cocky jabs at them, his words struck sudden fear into me, anxiety. “Jean, you’re aware of what Levi and I do?” 

"Yeah. You guys try to sneak into Sina and like…infiltrate the government, or something." I paused, then quickly added, "You guys did it with my dad before he died." I knew there was more to it than that, and I knew more than I was letting on, and I knew they knew it, too. These two and my dad go  _way_ back, thus them being two of the only people in the world he trusted enough to watch over the baby son who he held so dear. And who, on another note, could shoot lightning out of his hands. That was problematic with babysitters. 

Erwin nodded sullenly. “You know as well as I do that’s an extremely simple and bastardized version of it, but in short, yes. We do missions in attempts to bring change to this land, ruled under an iron-fisted dictatorship.” That definitely sounded better. 

My head bobbed with age-old comprehension. “Right. I know, Dad talked about it all the time. Okay, but you’re not answering my question- what’s it got to do with me?” My question answered itself as soon as the words parted from my lips, and my mouth ran dry. “…Oh, no. Haha, no. If you’re going to say what I think you’re going to say,  _no_.” 

"Jea-" began Erwin, but I cut him off sharply, baring my teeth and shaking my head. 

"I’m not helping you two try to wreak anarchy or whatever. I’m not my dad. Let me say that again so I know you hear me:  _I’m not my dad_. I don’t want to get into Sina like that, I don’t want to go on any political missions  _especially_  because my condition could get me killed in Sina, and for fuck’s sake, I don’t want to get the Box. The Box. Doesn’t. Exist.” 

"It's real, alright," snapped Levi sharply. 

I rolled my eyes. Great. I was summoned here just to hear  _this?_ "It's a fairytale. It is a literal, honest-to-God fairytale. Look. I love you guys, but you're growing into a senile old men- you must be to be chasing something like that! There isn't some super secret magic box the King, like, sacrifices a goat to to rule over Maria and Rose. Seriously, how stupid does that sound?" 

"Because that's not how Pandora's Box works." Levi's voice had taken on a guarded, dangerous tone, his words spat at me in a thin hiss. I grew quiet quickly as he seethed. "It exists. We know it exists. The only thing we don't know is how exactly it operates. And if you would shut the fuck up for a second and let us talk, maybe you'd learn a thing or two, to." 

I spent my life hearing stories about Pandora's Box. I don't want to hear any more. 

Everyone knows the general story, it's a tale passed around in nurseries to children based on no truth. Practically penned by Mother Goose. The story goes that one hundred years ago, after the walls were built, the King had a wizard (a  _wizard_ \- and Levi and Erwin think this exists?) create a magic box for him called Pandora's Box, which he used to gain his power to rule over the other walls. Because a cube would do that, as opposed to, I don't know, the genetically enhanced guards to crush every rebel trying to oppose to monarchy to smithereens. From there, the story varies from person to person, depending entirely on which version was learned. Some versions say the Box was destroyed and that's why there's peace, some say a hero will take the Box and save mankind, some say this, some say that. It's a myth. It's fantasy. It's a game to little kids who hear the story then go out and tackle each other in fields playing 'Grab the Box'. It's not. Real. 

However, my father had different ideals. He would stay up all night reading book after book on whatever information on the Box he could find (considering it doesn't exist, there wasn't a ton). Then Levi and Erwin got swept up in it, and their attempted trips into Sina became obsessive over the goal of snatching some wonder cube from their clutches and using it for good. They never really talked about details of any of their trips, but the fact that they always came back empty-handed was enough of an indicator they never struck success, making how and how far they got into Sina unimportant. They're just Ponce de Leons chasing after the Fountain of Youth. And if they thought I wanted to hop on, they were crazy. 

But Levi looked mad enough to stop me from protesting at that exact moment. 

"Listen," he spat. "First off, life lesson: picking fights that easily is gonna wind your ass up nowhere but those Sina jail cells that the royal guards drag their bare, stinking asses over and the King pisses in. Got it?" I stayed silent. "Second: don't think it's made up. There's evidence, if you could be bothered to shove your thick skull against a book. And maybe we're talking to you to see if you could help us, fine. But listen before you throw a fucking hissyfit. Got it?" 

My teeth were clenched and his navy blue gaze burned against mine. With my tongue pressed hard to the top of my mouth, I slowly dipped my head in a hesitant nod. And that was all the permission they needed. Erwin sucked in a breath and hid his hands in his pockets, speaking slowly. "I won't lie to you. We're here to seek your aid in our mission, as we've found little success. While we're quite aware that you are not your father, you are no less his son, and he was brilliant when it came to the execution of the plans. And...well. There is certainly another aiding factor to why we are here. You have assets, Jean, that neither Levi, nor I, nor even your father possessed. And we believe that may increase the chance of success, if you are able to repel the guards with the same force they fight against us with." 

I narrowed my eyes, unsatisfied with the explanation given. "So because I'm my dad's son and I have an ancestor who was an illegitimate bastard kid of a guard and peasant, I'm up for recruiting?" 

Erwin sighed. "You're arguing. You won't consider it if something's not in it for you, we figured as much." I jumped to bark at him, then stopped myself short and stood up straight again, chewing the inside of my cheek. They were right. Was I really this selfish? "...We do have an exchange to offer, should it be necessary for your convincement." 

I raised my eyebrows. "An exchange?" I repeated, bewildered. What could they possibly offer me of my own interest? "What kind of exchange?" 

Levi turned to Erwin, sharing a look between them that I couldn't quite read. Then Erwin turned back to me. "...We have means of getting into the interior. We know how to get into Sina unseen better than anyone. Ever since you were small, you've said you wanted to live in the inside wall. Should this still be true, in exchange for you help, we will get you into Sina and you can live there for the rest of your days." Whoa. They could get me into the interior? I wanted nothing more than to live in the safety and perfection that was Sina, where sickness didn't exist and there was always more than enough food to eat. My mind had already begun to whirl with possibilities. I could live as a guard with my powers, reside in a palace and do nothing all day and be pampered just for standing around. 

And they would help me get there? "Really?" 

"Yes." Erwin nodded, then breathed in and looked at Levi again. "One more thing. Levi?" 

Levi seemed to understand what he meant, reaching into his coat pocket and producing a small white envelope. I frowned in confusion, Levi passing it to me. I glanced at him, then at the paper in my hands, running my thumb under the seal to pop it open. I slowly slid out the contents- a folded up sheet of paper. Tucking the envelope into my back pocket, my eyes flicking warily between Levi and Erwin to the paper, I unfolded it and smoothed it against my thigh. One look at the writing and I gasped, recognizing it immediately, bringing my free hand to my mouth. "No way...where did you find this?" 

"Did you read it?" Levi asked back, not answering. 

I blinked down at the piece of paper in my now trembling hands, sucking in a puff of air. "...Jean," I began, reading the letter out loud, trying to keep my voice from cracking. "I hope you never have to read this, as- fuck." I squeezed my eyes shut, shook my head, then began reading again. "I hope you never have to read this, as I've asked Levi and Erwin to give you this if the worst befalls me. Considering what I do, this is very possible, but remember I do it for you, and for all of us." I gulped hard. "I only ask that, if you're my only living legacy, to not let my work go to waste. I don’t wish for you to endanger yourself, so be careful. I trust Levi and Erwin to watch over you. Take care of a mother. I love you. Love, D-. L-love, Dad." Fuck. I rapidly opened and closed my eyes to try to wick away tears gathering. My hands shook and I didn't look at the two before me until I had tucked it in an inside pocket in my jacket. Their looks had softened by the time I tipped my chin back up, probably with something of pity. I bit my wobbling lip and crossed my arms. "...Do you guys have a plan? Do you have steps for me to follow?" 

"...Depends," came Levi cautiously. "Will you do it?" 

I'll get into the interior. It's what my dad would've wanted me to do. Death was a huge probability, but hell, I'm talented as fuck and admired for my skills. I wouldn't die.  

"I'll do it. Tell me what I need to do, and tell me how to survive it." With the words spoken, I've sealed my fate, for better or worse. 

Erwin and Levi visibly relaxed in relief, and I swallowed hard. "Thank you, Jean. He would be proud," said Erwin. "We've developed strategies, and a specific one for you. You are talented and strong, you'll be fine. If you'd like, I can give you a communication device if you have questions while carrying out the mission." 

"Okay, yeah, we- wait, what? Wait, hold on,  _communication device?_ Why are those neede- aren't you guys gonna be with me?" 

"If we were able to go ourselves, we would," muttered Levi. "I twisted my ankle, Erwin fucking broke his right arm-" Erwin cringed. "-and the guards can practically smell us coming at this point. You're going in alone."  

My eyes bulged and I took half a step backwards, shaking my head. "Alone? Me? Go into a fucking death trap for a mystical box by myself? Why the fuck didn't you  _mention this_ before I agreed?" 

"You didn't ask," replied Levi simply, which really pissed me off. 

"That's cheating! That's playing dirty!" I barked, angered. 

Levi's lip curled back in a snarl. "If you don't play dirty, you'll never achieve anything. Now are you gonna stop yelling at me because you didn't read the terms and conditions and listen to the plan to better humanity and avenge your dad or not?" 

I opened my mouth to retort, then bit the inside of my cheek and curled my hands into fists, nails pressing into my palms. I clenched my teeth and let a hiss of hot breath seep between them. I closed my eyes, jaw clenching. "...Tell me how to get the Box." 

I opened them again to see Erwin beginning to smile, nodding and raising his left hand. "I was hoping you'd say that." 

* * *

I stood in darkness with my hand wrapped around a metal rung protruding from the side of the pipe, breathing deeply. I squinted upwards at the bottom side of a manhole I can't see. "So, just climb up here and push that open and I'm in?" 

"Yes," came a quieted voice next to me. "Remember what Levi and I told you." 

"Yeah, yeah. It'll spit me into an alley, and there's usually not a lot of people there, but get out of sight as quickly as possible anyway." 

"Right. Then what?" 

I paused to think for a moment. "...Head down for the palace, which will be obvious to me, because I can see it high above the buildings. Right?" 

"Correct. Go on." 

I gnawed my lip. "Then continue down and try not to be seen. When I get there-" 

"And if you are seen?" 

"Act like I live there." 

"Yes." 

"-I'm looking for an abandoned watch post turret kinda detached from the palace and sneak in. Then go down the stairs in there, which  _oh-so-conviently_ lead into the palace." 

"It makes logical sense. After all, when it was in use, the watch guards needed to get inside quickly if they ever spotted anything." 

"Right, right, I was just pointing it out, not complaining. Then just some generic fight to the vault. I can do that. Lightning helps. So when I get to the vault, you just tell me what to do from there, right?" 

A hand came to rest on my shoulder, and I breathed out. "Yes. We believe in you. I'll be with you every step of the way." Erwin tapped the small device in my ear. "As will your father." He pressed a finger over where my heart lay beating in my chest. "Are you ready?" 

I nodded but then remembered he couldn't see me any more than I could see him so I spoke up instead. "Yeah. I'm ready. Let's go overthrow the government." 

He laughed, which is kind of strange, because that's not a thing most people would laugh at. Ah, whatever. Dude's always been a looney bird. I began climbing up the rungs, keeping one hand above me to feel for the top so I don't bash my skull against it. A couple more steps and my fingertips brushed metal. "At the top," I called down. 

"Alright," came the response. "It might take a little pushing, but it should come off relatively easily." I nodded, pushing against the metal experimentally and feeling it wiggle. I frowned and nudged it, and the metal circle lifted above my hand. I squinted as a crescent sliver of light came tearing in, edging the side I had moved. "Good. Just push it all the way off and you're in." Carefully adjusting my weight so that I could stand handless on the ladder without falling backwards, I lifted both my hands, gritting my teeth as I pushed against it, gasping as it lifts and more beams of situationally blinding light are shoved against my sockets. "Okay, now crawl through and duck for cover." 

I gritted my teeth and shoved the metal off the opening occupied altogether with a clang, shying away before breathing in and crawling up the last couple of rungs to poke my head out. Here I am. I'm in Sina. 

I blinked as I tried to adjust, gazing around with wonder. The more I looked around, the more my jaw dropped. My mind scrambled to comprehend what I was seeing. How could any place be so...clean? Everything was white and pristine, and the air was so pure I felt dizzy. The sun was out overheard- the sun!- and the sky was blue-  _blue!_  It was like a dream.  

"Got it?" A muffled voice came from beneath me, and I blinked, looking down at the now illuminated Erwin beneath me. 

"Yeah." 

He squinted. "Anyone around?" 

I glanced over my shoulder. As Erwin had promised, the alley I was in was void of people. It was empty, the ivory buildings glittering underneath the golden light cast from the sky. And oh my god, the street actually was paved with gold.  _Seriously?_ "No. Just my hopes and dreams, beckoning to me, and I want to get up and embrace them." 

Erwin chuckled. "It's pretty visually impressive the first time, comparatively. But if you're successful, I'll keep to my word; you can live here for the rest of your life." 

As I gazed around, a smile crept onto my lips, and I bounced a little with giddiness at the thought. Living in luxury for the rest of my days for nothing but a dumb little box.  

I hauled myself up and out, standing up and dusting my hands off and looking around just to take in the beauty of it all, so stunned by how amazing just this alleyway was. And I couldn't wait to see the rest of the city. 

Above the narrow line of the building tops rose the outline of an even greater structure outlined against the sunshine. I couldn't see it very well from my distance, but it had grand arches stretching up to the sky and I could spot golden flags waving from the top. I drew in a deep breath and murmured down to Erwin. "...The palace?" 

"I can't see what you're looking at, but the answer is probably yes. It's hard to miss." 

"That fortress is my destination?" 

"Yes." 

Crap. I nodded and, once I gave a terse nod to Erwin and covered the hole again, starting walking forward. With a tap of the device in my ear, it whirred to life, Erwin's voice guiding my steps. I kept my back pressed to the buildings, which were strangely empty. When I asked Erwin about this, he responded that this was actually perfectly normal for Sina, and that I was just used to the overpopulation of Rose. Fuck these rich people. 

The first time I walked by other passerbyers, I went rigidly still and gulped, being spat out into an open park-like area. A couple and a family walked by me, all far more lavishly dressed than I in my half-leather street outfit, but none seemed to pay me any attention and kept walking by. Erwin told me that they don't have any business in even looking at anyone but themselves, which gave me relief as much as it made me mad. I kept waking.   

Eventually, after some tricky navigating and instinctual hiding, I stumbled upon a grassy hill, closer to the palace than I had been, with the top of a silvery turret peeking out from the top. 

My eyes widened, and I instantly dropped down to lay stomach-down in the grass, tapping the device in my ear. "Erwin," I whispered. "I think I see the post. I mean, if it's the post that you've been directing me to. What do I do now?" 

"Just walk up to it," he replied calmly, his voice buzzing from the tiny black circle attached to my ear. "Call as little attention to yourself as possible, because this is entering the inner ring territory of the palace. You'll start to have to deal with guards, which you didn't before. Be careful." 

My throat was dry because while helpful, Erwin's words were far from reassuring. I breathed out then responded. "'Kay. And the watch post is absolutely abandoned?" 

"Yes." 

"And it'll lead me straight into the palace? Right into a room?"  

I could never check enough. "Yes," Erwin said. "Levi and I have done it many times. There'll be a trap door, and you need to lift it up and there's a staircase leading down into the palace. When you go into the post, just-" 

"Yeah. Got it." Coughing a little on the puff of dust that arose from me opening the door, I squinted down at the darkness of the staircase leading downwards it revealed. 

Erwin laughed. "You're already there?" 

"I was walking while you were talking." 

"Exactly the kind of diligence Levi and I were looking for," he mused. 

I sighed and rolled my eyes, beginning to slowly work myself down the steps. "Don't get your hopes up," I muttered. "I ain't no hero that you'd need for this job, I'm just what was available." 

"You'll be fine, Jean," he replied as I started descending down the spiraling staircase, putting complete faith that it would lead me into the palace interior safely. "We wouldn't have asked you if we didn't think you were capable. Oh. And Jean?" 

"Hm?" 

"...I'm very sorry. I need to go." 

"'Kay, I- wait. No. Wait!" I stopped, my eyes widening as frowned. "No, you can't go! Erwin, I have no fucking idea what I'm doing out here!" I paused for a reply, then clenched my fist and whipped around when none came as if it would do something. "Erwin! Get back here! Hey! Erwin!" 

But no voice came to tell me to calm down or not to scream so loud. 

And so I screamed and bashed my fist into the wall in anger, cursing him for abandoning me when I needed him to keep my head on my shoulders. I was on my own.  

* * *

Sneaking around in a palace was by no means easy business. 

With Erwin suddenly cutting out, I had no clue where I was going. I was stumbling and bumbling around the grand floor it had spat me out into, and most of my time I spent trying to cram myself into creative hiding places. Sometimes this worked. Sometimes this did not. 

A population of guards filled the interior, standing with their arms behind their backs all along the hallway I was in at different doorways. They had silver uniforms with dark gray and white unicorn emblems stitched onto the backs of their uniforms and knee length black boots, and some of the higher guards had stupid black hats with silver crests.  

I managed to evade most of them, one way or another, but there was still a couple that saw me, which was problematic. I just sprinted as fast as I could away from them and hid again, and I could hear them discussing my presence from my hiding spots, often grouping together to go search for me in small groups. 

I was scared, lost, and inevitably dead. 

* * *

 This thing was like a labyrinth. I wondered if I was getting close to the vault room- I must've been, I had to have been! I slammed by back against a wall next to yet another open doorway, blinking and carefully craning my head to look inside. 

A very large and dimly lit room stretched out before me, pillars lining the sides. It seemed pretty empty, but at the way back of the vast room was a doorway edged in soft, gold light, popping against the darkness it otherwise had to offer. My eyes widened at the unfamiliar entryway. Considering I tried every other door in this hallway, that one seemed to be the only checkpoint I had yet to check. Swiping my tongue tip over my lips, I gazed around for the inevitability of guards, and probably a lot of them. 

I only saw one. 

A distinctively silver shape, too far away for one to make out details, stood at attention with his arms tucked behind his back on one side of the door, unmoving. The lopsided positioning gave me the impression that he was supposed to have a buddy on the other side who was on break or taking a piss or something, so if I was going to go in, I had better do it fast before they had the chance to return. 

I yanked my head back to press back-first flat against the wall outside, breathed in deeply, said a prayer and thought of all the pretty women I would get to meet if I survived this as motivation, and then ducked inside. 

The guard didn't spot me immediately, I observed by lack of an initial reaction, which I used to my advantage to crouch with my side to the wall once inside, trying to use darkness as a cover. I paused and went rigidly still, waiting for him to jump at me, but it didn't come. Closing my eyes in relief, I shifted around to get on all fours, carefully, navigating the length of the wall in the most silent method I could. My eyes didn’t leave the distant guard, breathing shallowly from my mouth. I continued to crawl against the side of the room, the tiles under my palm cool, until I hit a point where I slowed, frowning. A sound reached my ears that made me tip my head in confusion. Running water? What? Why would there be running water in this room?  

I put a hand forward, but the patch of floor I had placed it on was inexplicably and inconveniently  _wet_ , and I made a huge mistake in instinctually squeaking as my palm slipped forward- but I had put my weight on it to support me as I crawled, so I came crashing down, too. 

My forehead slammed into the marble and sent a wave of ringing pulsing through my head into my ears. I squeezed my eyes shut and ground my teeth with the biting pain- although the voice in the back of my head telling me that I just called major attention to myself didn't help. 

Quick footsteps suddenly echoed around the room, and I hissed as a wobbly voice began to speak, sounding like static in my buzzing ears. "Who goes there?" the voice demanded. 

 _I'm dead. I'm dead. I'm fucking dead I'm so fucking dead I am literally dead._  

With a sharp breath, I pushed myself up from lying stomach down on the floor, sighing and keeping my eyes shut. "You gonna kill me?" I spat out the question. 

There was a pause and I groaned. "Who goes there?" the voice then repeated. "You don't look authorized to be here." 

"So we're just gonna ask questions back and forth without answering the other's, is that how this is gonna work?" With a grunt, I opened my eyes and snapped my head over, concentrating all the anger in my body into a single venomous glare at the guard before me. 

He was young, I noticed. Couldn't have been more than two years older or younger than me. He had dark hair and slightly tan skin, which really stood out against he bright, shiny uniform he was in. His age gave me hope that maybe he was inexperienced, and although I knew he must've had powers, he was otherwise unarmed. 

And in his dark eyes looking down at me, I did not see a malicious glint. I saw nervousness. 

He stared at me, hesitating before speaking again. "If you refuse to state your identity and business I will escort you to a holding cell to be interrogated." 

I rolled my eyes, leaning against the wall for support as I heaved myself back up. "Oh, don't give me that bullshit, you were gonna do that anyway." He was a little taller than me, I observed once I was standing up. Damn. There goes using height as an intimidation factor. 

His eyes narrowed. "Sir, please come with me." 

I bared my teeth, deciding that I wasn't going down into the holding cell after all. "Like hell I'm going with you, spoiled bastard." And when he reached forward to grab my arm, I drove my knee forward with all the force I could muster into his stomach.  

He let out a shallow, breathless noise, and I assume I kneed the wind out of him. I took advantage of it, slipping my arm out of his grip to ball my hand into a fist and land it in his sternum. I gritted my teeth because it hurt me too, but it did successfully send him stuttering back a few steps. Trying to run could've still been too dangerous as he was still more than able to fight me if I did, so to kick him down and make him stay down, I reared back to send my fist smashing into his jaw. Yet when I swung it forward, I stopped in my tracks as there was a hand darting out to lock into my wrist with an iron vice, and my hand went limp. Suddenly, my body was thrown back and I saw stars with the pain of bring thrown against the wall like a ragdoll. I could feel my bones rattle and I gasped, but I didn't have time to breathe before hands were at the scruff of my jacket and I was smashed onto the floor. 

Everything stung and I heard a great crack ad I was bashed from one hard surface right into another and I couldn't  _think_  past the pain. I laid down, dazed, thinking that I maybe had something of a concussion, as I saw the blurry silver shape of the guard loom over me. 

"...I-I'm sorry," he whispered, then cleared his throat and resumed speaking more firmly. "I'm sorry for having to resort to violence, but you attacked me and I acted in self-defense. Now, I will take you to the interrogators. Please don't try to resist, or I will have to-" 

"Hi-yah!" Even with my body screaming no, I somehow managed to twist around and kick with both my feet at the guard's shins. This made his knees buckle and he folded over and I staggered to my feet, running purely on adrenaline and the numb it brought with it. Curling a fist and holding onto the fist with my other hand for extra leverage, I drove my elbow back into the guard's skull, and he fell flat on his back. Panting and panicking, with the guard struck down I spun around to make a mad bolt towards the door, but my heels dug into the ground to stop myself as suddenly there was a crackling zig zag of lightning struck the wall just a hair's width in front of my nose. 

I whipped my head around to see the guard with his sparking hand raised, eyes narrowed in anger, a dribble of blood leaking from his nostril. He was pissed, using lightning, and I was a dead man walking. 

Before I could react, there was another bolt slamming into the wall behind me that would've jolted my spine if I hadn't arched my back. Although I hadn't revealed it to him yet, I had the same powers, so it was possible that if I was struck by another person's lightning I would conduct it, but it was not the time nor place to find out. So, doing a really dumb thing because I didn't have time to think, I took off sprinting as fast as I could to the door at the other end. I knew the guard was behind me and I could barely see where I was going and the floor was wet, shitfuckshitfuck I was slipping, shitfuck  _why was it wet?_  And then I found out the answer to my question and wished I had not. 

In the darkness I couldn't see the sudden drop-off of the floor where a trench full of water lay, and I was totally submerged. In an instant, a billion thoughts ran through my head. Where was the guard? Why was this trench here? Why was it full of water, of all things? Was this some sort of indoor moat? 

But then I thought about the guard himself, probably right behind me, lightning shooting from his palms and it hit me because I remembered that there is no better conductor of electricity than water. One little spark in one little corner and the lightning would course through the entire body of water and fry anything in it. A brilliant last defense system set up for invaders that could very well be my grave. 

I kicked my feet to pop my head above the water, gasping. I blinked rapidly to see the guard standing at the edge of the trench. Both his palms were raised at me and he glared, rearing back his hands. I gulped and quickly raised my own. A bolt of lightning shot from his fingertips, directed at me. I squeezed my eyes shut to brave myself as I quickly did the same. 

Instantly I felt myself shaken, and I popped open my eyes with surprise to see our identical lines of electricity colliding and pushing against one another, equal in force. They sparked wildly where they met, and I anxiously looked up at him. His eyes were round and wide with utter bewilderment, and we simultaneously did a movement where our hands raised upwards and our bolt followed to strike the ceiling. I yanked my hand back, detaching me from the lightning, and he did the same, and we met eyes. I had never seen someone look so shocked in my life. 

"You-you," he stuttered, voice tight, small, and disbelieving. "How did you- you're not a-?" But just to remind him that he wasn't dreaming like maybe he thought he was, I shot a lightning bolt into his chest, and his feet left the ground as he was sent flying backwards.  

I waited until I heard the crash of him slamming into the ground, and I heaved myself out of the water as fast as I could, sopping wet but alive. 

My jeans clung uncomfortably to my legs, which restricted movement. I looked over at the guard, who was kicking himself up and, stunned, shot another bolt, which I deflected. "Who  _are_ you?" he cried out. 

"Angry and wet," I replied, shooting one at him that he rolled out of the way of. This went on for a while, us jumping and shooting but rarely ever landing direct blows. He survived because of his training. I survived because I was doing my street show routine. 

I leaped over his strikes and he would counteract mine. We circled each other, livid and thirsting for a triumph that was not easily attainable. It was tug-of-war. Aggressive and lethal tug-of-war. 

And then he yanked his end of the rope too hard. 

I screamed as a bolt of electricity smashed into my stomach, sending hot pain searing through my being. I tasted the metallic tang of blood run over my teeth as I fell backwards, hands twitching. While the lightning did not kill me as it perhaps would a normal human, it still hurt like the devil just stuck my head into a socket and temporarily paralyzed whatever section it hit, which is why it was so important to avoid. I hissed as it drew it's course through my bones, arching up and smashing my clenched fist into the ground. I shakily tried to sit up, but I howled as another lightning bolt struck my left shoulder. My dominant hand. I curled up on instinct, quietly sobbing with the pain running through me that made my jaw go slack and eyes roll back. I heard footsteps slowly approach my shaking body, heavy and ragged breathing accompanying it. Glaring, I turned my head to give a look I hoped the guard would drop dead under as I clutched my arm, breathing out slowly from my mouth and spitting out a glob of blood and saliva.  

There was a short span of silence between us, the guard wiping at the crimson fluid dripping from his nose, before he spoke in a quiet voice of an unreadable tone. "The reinforcements are on their way, and I highly advise you don't try...fighting them." 

"I'm going to send you to Hell," I hissed in a raspy growl. 

"I don't like hurting people, I really don't," they guard continued as if I said nothing. "But you used violence, and I have sworn on my life to protect the King, and I can't have a dangerous delinquent trying to go after him! You know? That's my job, protecting our great and noble leader, and if you're a threat- especially one with inexplicable genetic enhancements like mine- then I can't let you pass, okay? I'm sorry for hurting you, but please understand that-" 

"I'm. Going. To send you. To  _Hell._ " I barked out the words louder and angrier this time, forcing him to listen, forcing him to look at me so I can see the sweat bead down his forehead as he looks into my eyes, full of hatred, and I know he knows I'm not kidding. Oh, god, the way he stood there and had the fucking  _nerve_ to humiliate me like I've never been before for the  _King_. These privileged bastards think he is truly something to protecting, and it disgusts me, and manifests in the anger suddenly overcoming me. "Every one of you," I spat. "You're all...so, so stupid. You waste your lives standing here, protecting that fat  _pig_ sitting on that golden over-stuffed chair. You tried to kill me in the name of that disgusting swine and you've paralyzed my arm and I want to tear you apart." 

 _Apart. Apart. Part, part, part._  

The word echoes as it resonated in the room and I held my glare on him, blood dripping from my mouth and pooling on the floor, chest heaving. From this distance, I could notice little things about him I hadn't picked up before. Freckles splattered across his cheekbones. He had short bangs that fell above his eyes.  And in his eyes was fear. 

We looked over as another wave of these silver-clothed sheep filed in from the entrance, fanning out to gawk at us. I clenched my teeth. "...Was this you, Marco?" came a short, blonde woman, hair tucked in a bun with one section of hair falling over one eye. 

The guard above me nodded. "Y-yes. He's an intruder, and I believe he has business taking down the King." 

"I don't want to kill the King, you fucking simpleton," I grunted from the ground. 

"Then what do you plan on doing?" said the blonde coldly. 

I didn't reply. 

"Well," said a woman with chin-length and wavy light brown hair, arms raised in a stretch above her head, fingers interlocked as she shoved her way to the front. "If he doesn't wanna talk, and he's dangerou-" 

"He can shoot lightning out of his hands like me," muttered the guard who took me down. "He's very dangerous." I curled my lip back in a snarl, half tempted to prove him right. But there were far too many guards here for me to fight off by myself. 

Gasps rippled through the small gathering, and I rolled my eyes. "Not really!" inquired the brunette, and the guard who took me down- Marco, she called him?- nodded. Her mouth fell open in an 'O' of surprise, then quickly bent down to peer at me. "You're not from 'round here, are ya? Yet you have genetic mods like us?" 

"It's inherited," I replied flatly, condescension heavy in my voice. Of course, these sheltered idiots wouldn't know about people like me. They probably only know what the King wanted them to, and I'm not on that list. 

"I wanna see, I wanna see!" she squealed. "Do it, do the lightning!" 

I didn't move an inch. 

She pouted and sighed, putting her hands on her hips. "You're no fun," she said quietly, disappointment evident in her words. She looked back up. "I believe you though, Marco. So! Mystery intruder in the palace with powers who put up a fight, right? That's no good, we're gonna have to do something about it." She crossed her arms behind her back and rocked up on her tip-toes, grinning. "...Whaddya think, Marlo?" I frowned, thinking she mis-said 'Marco' until a guard next to her with black hair in a neat undercut turned his head. "I say we pull the  _big one_." I didn't like the sound of that. 

The guy named Marlo wheeled around quickly. "Do we- can we authorize that, Hitch?" 

Hitch frowned. "Can guards authorize an action _taken by guards?_ Geez Bowlhead, what're you, an idiot?" 

Marlo stomped his foot incredulously. "But we shouldn't-!" 

"If an action is considered just," began the blonde, staring me down with an icy blue gaze, "then what objections can be made? I think it's righteous. Our job is to keep peace, so taking action towards those who disrupt it is our responsibility. Marco." Marco jumped as his name was called, and the blonde woman stepped up to him, pressing one foot down on my ribcage to ensure I wasn't going anywhere. I groaned softly against the floor. "I think you know what this means."  

Marco visibly tensed, eyes large. 

Hitch clapped and giggled, walking up to them. From a matching white belt with holsters attached on her hips and thighs, she produced a golden pistol, and my heart stopped as she passed it over to Marco. "You took him down, Marco! So you get the honor of killing him!" 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hello everybody and welcome to my newest fanfiction, Pandora's Box! im beyond ecstatic to get this started, so thank you very much for reading this first chapter (and putting up with all the exposition hahaha)! im super excited for the rest of the plot to kick in and to develop on certain relationships. i hope you all enjoyed it, and i'll be sure to get the next chapter up ASAP. my tumblr is [here](http://jeankirstchein.tumblr.com/) so hollah at me there.  
> feedback is always great, i'd love to know what you all think.  
> thank you again for reading!!


	2. To Hell With I.O.U.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I hate owing people shit.  
> Like, really, really hate owing people shit.

So, recap: two old men sent me on a box hunt in a castle and now I had my arms restrained behind my back and the muzzle of a gun nuzzling up to my nape. Admittedly, things could've gone better. 

"Take him outside," said the blonde guard whose name was revealed to be Annie quietly. "Do it quick and painlessly." 

"Yeah. His Majesty  _hates_ blood on the floor! Although I think the custodial staff hates it even more," piped up Hitch. "Is this your first time, Marco?" 

The person standing behind me and tightening my bonds was the freckled bastard named Marco, the one holding the gun to my head and the one given the privilege of killing me. I gritted my teeth as he jostled me around. With my back to his chest, I would've flicked my wrist to send him flying backwards by planting a lightning bolt in his gut, but that'd make all the other guards attack me, and if I couldn't beat one, then I'd be dead faster than I could blink with all of them after me. Another restraint they had shoved me in were the humiliating black rubber gloves they forced my hands into, which I couldn't do shit into anyway. Rubber doesn't conduct electricity. "Y-yeah," Marco replied shakily, and I curled my fists. "I've never had an actual intruder before like you guys have." 

"Most people don't make it this far into the interior of the palace," supplied Annie. "I don't know how he got past all the other guards, but it doesn't matter. Kill him quickly, and we'll file in a report and request security on the double." 

"You do know what to do, right, Marco?" asked Hitch. 

Marco yanked again, and I hissed. "Um. Y-yes." 

"Pop a cap in that sucker's head," said Hitch anyway. "Normally we could just electrocute them but we don't wanna take any chances with some freak like us!"  _I don't like the word freak._ "Then you just gotta drop off the body off palace grounds. I usually just dump bodies in the crates down by the river because no one ever looks inside them and so we won't freak out the public. So don't be seen, and don't let them see what you got, either. That'd be bad!" 

The way she said it so casually like it was nothing sent shivers down my spine. She talked as if it were a game. These people sickened me. "Alright. I'll do that. So...I'll be back in...twenty minutes?" 

The others nodded. A few clapped Marco on the back and congratulated him, and some gave me looks of disgust while I got looks of fascination from others. I glared at all of them. Then, one by one, they filed out of the room. 

And I was left alone with the son of a bitch whose blood I've sworn to spill.  

I was going to die, I registered this at least, but I didn't plan on going down without fighting. So when Marco gently tapped the gun on my shoulder and told me to stand up, I bowed my head and planned all the ways to kill him without using lightning as I rose to my feet. The gun returned to press into the base of my skull, and I felt Marco's hand on my shoulder. We were silent as he began guiding me towards a wall, which I frowned at, as Hitch said to take me outside. But as we approached it, I noticed, if I squinted, a faint rectangular outline. A door? There were hidden doors? How many did I miss?  

Marco clenched a hand around the scruff of my jacket and I swallowed as he reached out and pushed against it, and the door swung open.  

The mouth of a staircase spiraling down to depths I did not know stretched before me, illuminated by sparking balls of blue electricity captured in small, glass cases attached to the brick wall. I blinked down it, giving a puzzled frown to Marco, but he wasn't looking at me. With one last glance at the room we had just left, he pushed me forward and closed the door behind me, turning a tiny knob I assumed was a lock and breathing out shakily.   

We were both still, his back to me and his forehead and front to the door, and I moistened my lips and looked around. "...This isn't outside." 

"No, but it leads there," he replied quietly, not turning to look at me. 

I tipped my head. "Shouldn't you be taking me there, then?" 

He was hesitant in replying, and I felt my pulse throb in my throat with anxiety. I didn't trust him at all and the fact that he hadn't taken me straight outside made me nervous. Did it really lead back to the exterior of the building? He wasn't even looking at me! 

I cleared my throat, reminding him to answer me, and he bowed his head forward to press his scalp to the door and let out a deep sigh. "No," he murmured quietly. 

Huh? Those were his orders given, weren't they? "What do you mean, no?" I questioned cautiously. 

Marco groaned and quietly thumped his fist on the door in frustration before spinning around to face me. Distress and wild panic flared in his dark eyes, lip quivering.  "I-I'm," he began, voice cracking, and swallowed hard. I tensed up. "I...am unworthy of my position." He bent his head forward, setting the gun down on the ground to bury his face in his hands. "I can't do it," he whispered frantically, although I didn't know if he spoke to me or if he was talking to himself. "I can't do it, I can't do it! What's wrong with me? I need-! I need to protect the King, and I need to kill you and it'd be so easy but I just can't do it. I shouldn't be a guard, I shouldn't be a guard..." 

I watched in stunned silence as he rapidly babbled to himself, shaking his head and extending his fingers to curl into his hair. He said he couldn't kill me. He said...he couldn't kill me. 

Part of me said to run away while he was like this, but another part of me thought better of running off a palace stairwell with no verification of where it actually lead. So I stayed put, and when I spoke, my words were quiet and controlled. "...You don't want to kill me, do you." He shook his head, still not looking up. I breathed deeply and kept talking in that low, lethal tone, deciding to insure myself. And if there was one thing I could do other than pick fights and put on shows, it was talk. "You can't stomach the thought of pulling a trigger against a living, breathing human's head and taking their lives. Staining your hands with blood. My mother would collapse on the spot and cry, she would cry for days and days. I've seen her do it when my father died. And my friends would grieve me, and all the little children of my district would wait for me and wait and I'd never come home. And it'd be because you pulled a trigger. And you don't want that, do you." 

I was dangerous with lightning, but with words, I was perfectly lethal.  

Marco let out a pitiful high-pitched whimper, fingers reaching up to curl in his hair and tug, wildly shaking his head. I thought he was about to cry. Good. That meant I would live for just a little longer. 

I breathed in deeply and forced a hard swallow down my throat before speaking again. "...What do I do, then? What are you going to do about...me?" 

"…" He mumbled something into his palms, and I paused, cocked my head and he repeated it, louder but still a rushed whisper. "Run." 

"You want me to run?" 

He took his hands down from his face to stare me down, lip still wobbling and hands trembling to match. "Run," he begged. "This tunnel leads to outside, like I said. I'm going to let you go on the one condition that you will run back to Rose or Maria or wherever you come from and never show your face here again because they will kill you, and they will kill me. Please, just go, and go fast, don't be seen!" He yanked at my bonds in a certain way, crooking his finger under a knot, and the bonds fell loose, and my eyes widened but I wasted no time in shoving them off my wrist and tearing off my gloves, backing away from him and stumbling down stairs as I did. 

He was rapidly looking back and forth as I began descending (either go wherever this staircase lead and half a chance of survival or stay here and ensure my death), when I looked over my shoulder. My heart stopped as I saw him pick up the gun in shaky hands and cock it. Was he going to shoot me while I was running?  

But he looked at me, then behind himself, then back at me and frantically gestured me onwards. It clicked that the other guards were probably looking to hear a gunshot, assuming it was a fatal blow whether it'd actually be killing me or not. And Marco needed to give them one. 

We held eye contact for the briefest of lapses, his eyes wild, sweat glistening on his cheekbones. "What are you waiting for? Go!" 

I didn't need any more. Without so much as a nod or a thank you, I was wheeling around and dashing down the stone steps as fast as my legs could carry me, arms pumping as adrenaline pumped through my head. Down, down they spiraled, my skin illuminated with a dazzling blue glow from the lightning lanterns, dog tags drumming against my chest with every heavy step. I was alive. I was alive. 

After a time period I wasn't sure how long for it was blurred in my head, the steps began to even out and shallow, and I assumed I was close to the bottom. My feet skittered to a rough stop and my eyes widened, jumping at the startle and hands coming up to slam over my ears, as the unmistakable crackling boom of a gunshot rang out from somewhere above me. My pulse nearly doubled, pounding in my ribs at a near breath-hindering pace, and my hands stretched out in front of me to brush the inside of a door. I gasped and my footsteps stuttered to a stop, fingers clenched around the handle, swallowing hard. That damn guard named Marco told me this lead outside. But to where outside? And I was still perfectly skeptical if he was telling the truth or not.  

However, I only had two options. Risk the guard's word, or go back and die for certain. 

Considering I needed to live in order to royally kick Erwin's ass, I picked option number one. 

I bit my lip as I turned the knob carefully, hearing a click, and I quietly swung it open. On instinct, I cringed at the sudden wave of brightness slamming me into the stone wall behind me and searing imprints into my dark-adjusted eyes. So either this was outside or somebody was holding one hell of a flashlight. But I felt the sun's warmth on my chest, and a breeze absentmindedly toy with my hair, and I guessed I was outside, after all. 

I cracked open an eye to see a stretch of unfamiliar but unattended land before me. A meadow rolled down a hill, decorated with scattered red and blue flowers, rippling like water in the playful breeze. Where the fuck had this spit me out, exactly? This must've been a back exit, considering I came up to the palace from the side. Convenient, and I'll take it. So now it came down to me somehow doing a mad dash without being seen and getting back to Maria as fast as possible because now, I was dead- and to those I wasn't dead to, I was a wanted fugitive more than ever.  

So I took off sprinting before any guards could assemble, my sole driving force being every step brought me just a little closer to lodging the tip of my boot so far up Erwin Smith's anus that his ancestors would feel prostate stimulation. 

* * *

Considering I was still alive, managed to evade the wall guards through careful observance of their patterned movements and sneaking past when they predictably turned, stumbled my way around until I had found the road I walked to the palace on and traced it back, and was walking through the pipes to the best of my memory to get back home, it was pretty good motivation. 

My chest was still heavy from panting as I made my way through the pipes, one hand to the pipe wall to support myself so my shaking legs didn't give out from under me.  _Kill Erwin. Kill Erwin. Kill Erwin._ _And might as well fucking kill Levi while I'm at it, fuck him, fuck them both._  

I startled as I bumped face-first into the ladder that I had first crawled down here on and grunted, hissing out a "Shit!" and clasping my palm to my forehead where I smacked into it. Nice going, me. I sighed and shook my head, swinging myself up on the ladder and climbing up with gritted teeth, nudging  open the manhole cover and again, yelping of pain as the light hits me. 

It wasn't nearly as bright as the light was in Sina, it never had been. But still- diluted sun seeping through a curtain of overcast was far brighter than the dark pipes I had just stepped out of. I cringed and brought my forearm to to forehead to shield myself from it. I hauled myself out, grumbling to myself and nursing a gooseegg, replacing the manhole cover and setting off in the direction where I know those two assholes would be. 

And twenty minutes later of glowering, I was knocking on the front door of my mother's house. 

The door swung open, and before me stood a stout woman with long chestnut hair pulled back from her face in a tight, thick ponytail. Her eyes fell open me in widened in happiness, and a smile touched her lips. "Jeanbo!" she exclaimed giddily. "My little boy, why didn’t you tell me you were going to come over? It's been months! I would've-" 

"Are they here?" I grunted, not interested in chitchat.  

She blinked, then smiled wider. "Yes, yes! Your uncle Erwin and uncle Levi are in the kitchen, dear. Would you like to eat lunch with us? I insist! It's been so long, Jeanbo, how is your business? How are you-?" 

I barged past her into the interior of the little house of my childhood. I didn't really mean to be rude, but I did not fucking have the time or patience right now to do anything other than harp on their asses. I stomped into the kitchen and sure enough, reclining in the chairs around a small circular table, were Tweedledum and Tweedledummer sipping tea. 

Erwin looked up. "Oh. Hello, Jean."  _"Oh. Hello, Jean," the fucker has the fucking audacity to say like he didn't just abandon me and would've gotten me killed if not for the cowardice of a guard._  

I narrowed my eyes. "Guys. You wanna talk for a sec? Outside?" I presented it as a question, but it was really a command. 

Erwin stared. "I haven't finished my tea." 

I glared at him with veracious ferocity that let him know that 'no' wasn't an option, and he sighed and stood up, Levi following suit with an irritated expression. My mom stuck her head in the room, frowning. "Where are you going? You all just got here!" 

"Just a second, Clarise," Erwin soothed. "Jean would like to talk to us in private." My mom nodded in comprehension, then hustled off into another room of the house, leaving us alone to go outside.  

I flung open the door as glared until they both popped out, then slammed it behind me and stood on the porch, arms folded. I sucked my teeth, debating what to say. Luckily, I didn't have to worry about breaking the silence myself. 

"Did you get the Box, Jea-?" began Erwin. And he would've finished, too, if my fist hadn't come flying square into his jaw. 

Erwin grunted and stumbled back a couple steps, clear blue eyes flicking from down to me, thick brows furrowed. Levi lunged forward, barking. "Hey! What the hell was that, brat?" 

"I could ask you the same thing!" I snarled. "No, I don't have the Box! You guys sent me into a goddamn death trap- alone! Erwin, you fucking abandoned me, I had no idea what to do! What the hell happened?" 

Erwin visibly breathed out, tense. "I'm sorry. Confidential." 

"Confidential," I repeated, almost mockingly, fists clenched and tiny sparks flying from my fingertips in anger. "Listen you two, I'm supposed to be dead right now! They caught me, and I was ordered to be killed, and the only reason I'm alive right now is because the guard who was supposed to kill me chickened out and let me go! To an entire population of people, I'm dead right now- do you know how sick that is?"  

They stayed silent for a second. "I'm sorry," came Erwin quietly. 

"I'm not," muttered Levi. "We told you exactly what would happen, and you accepted. Maybe we were being stupid to trust a kid as young as you with this job." 

At his biting words heavy with condescension, I flared up, stepping forward to land a punch in Levi's chest- and I would've been successful, had he not grabbed my fist mid-air and twisted my arm. I cried out in pain and my knees buckled, grinding my teeth as I doubled over when Levi released me and shuddered. "Fuck off!" I cried weakly. "I've been through enough today! I don't have enough fingers to show you how many near-death experiences I've had today because you two are obsessed with getting some fucking thing from Greek mythology!" I winced as I felt Levi's boot on my back to pin me to the ground and tapped my forehead into the stone under my body in defeat. 

"And whose fault is that?" he hissed coldly. 

"Levi," said Erwin next to him, his voice low and controlled. "Get off Jean. He's right. He's been through a lot." 

"Erwin," I heard Levi snap, "you know how important getting that thing is! He said he'd get it, and he didn't! He failed us!" 

"You're mad, I understand. But it's not his fault," counteracted Erwin. While his words were not angry, there was a definitive force behind them.  

There was a pause, and I felt the weight lifted from my back, and I sat up straight and gasped for air. Levi and Erwin were talking to each other in quiet tones that I could not understand, before turning to me. I narrowed my eyes and clenched my fist, sending little baby bolts of lightning running between my fingers just in case either of them tried any funny business. I didn't really want to injure them very badly, but I was fucking livid, and if they attacked, I was going to defend myself. 

When they turned back to me, both of them looked a little calmer, and Levi looked a little less like somebody shit just shat in his coffee. "Alright, fine, sorry," mumbled Levi, but he said it in the fashion of a little kid whose mom forced him to go apologize to the kid whose blocks he just kicked down. And knowing Erwin, that's probably exactly what happened.  

"Y'know," I muttered. "Dad probably is shaking his head at you hurting me." 

"You just punched me in the jaw," replied Erwin calmly.  

"Yeah, well, you deserved it, and we both know it." 

Erwin looked down at me and shook his head. "I think your father would be...dissappointed, in your giving up. We all have run that route many times, and we still fight. And you quit after your first trip. I respect your decision, however. It's not for everyone, and perhaps we were foolish to expect the same bravery your father possessed in you. It's not a trait inherited, it's acquired." He dipped his head as I stared at him, breathing heavily. "We apologize. You don't have to do that again if you don't want to. We appricate you helping us, and we only ask that you hold no grudge against us. With our injuries, it will still be a long while until we are able to go on another mission, so if you know anyone who has the resolve to enter restricted areas for the future of humanity, send them our way." He bowed at the waist, then put his hand on Levi's shoulder and began walking away. He only stopped to look over his shoulder and call, "Tell your mother we're sorry we have to go so soon, and thank her for the tea." 

Then they were gone, and I was laying on the ground, panting, watching them go, with a bruised arm and fistful of lightning I never sent after them. 

...He stood there and- and insinuated I was cowardly? I'm not! What's wrong with not wanting to die? What's wrong with not wanting to continue something to continue living and not causing grievance to all my four or so loved ones?  

Just because I'm my dad's son doesn't mean I'm just like him, I'm far from being just like him, and they shouldn't have made assumptions on how I would perform based on his performance!  

What the hell? I'm not a coward! Fuck these sociopathic assholes who can throw themselves into danger whenever they want and not feel a goddamn thing! It's not my fault I'm not like that!  

I'll...I'll prove it to them, that I'm not a coward. I'll train. I'll get stronger. Now that I know more about the inner workings of the palace and the guards, that'd give me an upperhand.  

I'll go back into the palace, fine, if it'll shut Erwin up. I'll go back into Sina and I'll get Pandora's Box.  

* * *

 This was a dumb idea, this was a dumb idea, this was a dumb idea.  

Why do I have ideas. They never turn out good.  

I laid on a Sina rooftop, the starlight twinkling down on me from above, panting raggedly. Holy shit. I thought going into Sina at night would make everything easier, but I couldn't see shit, and even more people were out than in the day. It had been two weeks since my last trip in, and I hadn't talked to Levi or Erwin since, but they wouldn't be hard to scout out once I got the Box. Or...that was the plan, that was rapidly falling apart. 

Since coming here the first time, I've been working everyday on my fighting skills, because I knew if I was gonna get into the palace, I was bruising myself into it. I'd find a forest, karate chop and completely fry a couple trees, and pretend it was fighting back. The same woods I played in as a kid, now destroying them like the asshole adult I was. 

So I snuck through the pipes and popped out here and was immediately spotted, which led me to a panicked chase before I realized the townspeople wouldn't follow me. Of course not, though- they were pathetically as scared of me as I was of them. They weren't the problem. 

The wall guards, perched on top of those fifty meter tall monstrosities, with super heightened sight and smell and hearing and flight suits? They were a problem.  

At this point, I've already had a couple duck after me, which I've managed to quickly evade by hopping rooftop to rooftop and shooting a couple out of the sky. Maybe this wasn't the brightest idea, because  _maybe_ some distinctly human-shot blue lightning from a rooftop shooting guards out of the sky attracted some negative attention- and a lot of it. Luckily, the night gave me at least  _some_ cover when my lightning wasn't illuminating me.  

Here's another problem- to the guards, I'm supposed to be dead.  

I couldn't afford to keep laying on this rooftop, catching my breath, because I only had so long until another group would be sent after me. So I hauled myself to my feet and began running again, thankful I was in a black leather jacket instead of those obnoxiously silver uniforms the guards were in that popped against the dark. I scanned my surroundings, panting, and seeing none, got to running again.  

I hopped over the spaces from building top to building, trying not to plummet to death. They were all packed relatively tightly together, so rooftop-jumping wasn't that hard to do. Guess they had to be, though, considering Sina had the smallest area of the three walls. I looked behind me, not seeing any silver blobs following me with arms stretched out like sugargliders, and I kept going forward towards the gleamingly pearl palace lit up by the ribbons of moonlight hanging from the sky.  

I was getting relatively close, close enough to see the exterior palace guards- the ones with enhanced strength for crushing any fiery rebels who decide it'd be fun to try to go into the palace- speckle the streets. Fuck. I had to stay out of sight of them. 

From the rooftop I was on now, they could spot me, so I swung off onto a veranda protruding from the side of the building, landing with as soft of a clang as I could manage. Pressing my back to a wall and craning my head around to peek at the guards on the ground, my eyes got huge and mouth fell open in a silent scream as I saw a cluster of guards on the same fucking floor I was on through the open window. I quickly snapped my head back to press against the wall, eyes wild with panic. What? Why were they in buildings? They're supposed to be on guard in front of the palace! 

But from the open window next to me, I caught a draft of conversation, and my mouth went dry. 

"...He's hopping on the rooftops, like some kind of nutjob!" came a voice, and I swallowed hard. Fuck, they were talking about me in there. "We should be on the ground for when he falls off, not in here!" 

"These are our orders," came another. "It makes sense. Spread out a network around the city where it'll be easier to catch him in the act." 

I heard a door open and close, and I assumed another guard entered. "Hey," greeted a new voice. "You guys on lookout duty too?" 

"Yeah." 

"Yeah." 

"You know who this guy is, right?" came the third voice, and my eyes widened. "He's the guy who broke into the palace a couple weeks ago, with the genetic enhancements!" 

A chorus of gasping followed the statement, and I cringed. "No way! But he's dead, isn't he?" came the first voice. "He was that Bodt guy's first kill, I heard all about it from Hitch! Are you sure it's the same guy?" 

"Yeah!" replied the third voice, almost excitedly. "They've identified him as the same guy, he was never dead!" 

"So that means- Marco let him live?" said the second voice, bewildered. "Marco said he killed him! I heard the gunshot!"  

"I don't know the details. But you know what that means, right?" 

There was a pause, and I was incredibly uneasy. 

"Marco's a traitor," whispered the third voice, although still loud enough for me to hear if I strained. "He didn't kill the rebel that he was supposed to, so we have no way of knowing if he was in cahoots with him or not. He disobeyed orders. So now they're gonna kill him too." 

I don't know when I started breathing so heavily, but I was suddenly acutely aware that I was practically heaving in breaths. My eyes were wide and my fists were clenched. They were- they were going to kill both of us. 

But I couldn't let them kill him. For better or worse, whether I (really didn't) wanted to or not, I owed him my life.  

I had to get out of here and I had to save that goddamn freckled bastard who was too much of a coward to kill.  

* * *

He wasn't easy to find.  

I had to hop from rooftop to rooftop, closer and closer to the palace, until I saw interior guards leaking out from the side in clusters. And one cluster was tighter than the others and centered around one dark-haired guard. 

 _I cannot believe I'm doing this._  

They brought him to his knees. 

 _I can turn back now. The world ain't gonna stop spinning if I turn back._  

I saw the flash of metal glint in the moonlight, and I swallowed at the click of it being cocked. The guard on his knees sobbed.  

 _I don't have to do this._  

They held the gun to his nape. 

 _But I'm going to do it, anyway._  

And from my perch I suddenly leapt, rolling forward and, before any of them could react, I was shooting the most powerful lightning I could conjure down the spines of the four guards barricading the one I meant to save.  

They all jolted with the tell-tale shudder of eletrocution and fell to their knees in screaming collapses. There was Marco, on his knees, gawking at me through eyes glowing red with tears. I knew the guards were only temporarily paralyzed though, and I didn't have much time before they were back on their feet, so I sprinted forward and hooked my arm under Marco's, pulling him to his feet and then yanking him after me as I sprinted towards in the direction of the path to the back alleyway I had entered Sina in. "Wh- why-?" he began, voice cracking, but I didn't look back at him, and kept sprinting.  

"Shut up," I panted out. "Don't talk. We're both fugitives here now, and if either of us are seen by anyone, we're dead. So if you want to live, shut up and follow me." 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> omg thank you all so so much for your kudos and comments!! the first chapter alone already has 924 hits, 62 kudos and 28 bookmarks omfg thats insane aaaaHH thank you it really motivates me!!  
> [ALSO THERES THIS AMAZING FANART](http://hdotk.tumblr.com/post/86330528255/all-things-considered-though-if-she-had-bothered) BY THE WONDERFUL [HDOTK](http://hdotk.tumblr.com) THAT I HAVENT STOPPED YELLING OVER TBH  
> so anyway this chapter was a lot of fun, and will set up the entire rest of the story. stick around- im really excited for the rest of this story to unfold!!  
> also quick note- if youd like to make a post about this story, please tag it with **#fic: pb**.  
>  thank you for reading!


	3. The Difference Between Impulsiveness and Idiocy

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Fuck everything. Fuck this, fuck him, fuck me.   
> But mostly fuck him.

We didn't stop running for a long, long time.  

I didn't turn back to look at him and just kept him towed behind me, hand fisted in the fabric of his sleeve as I pulled him along until he could keep up with me himself. It was down the meadows, over the roads, behind the buildings with double the guards on look out for both of us now, flattening ourselves against alleyways and snaking around and shooting the few people who stood in our way until we're down the more secluded alleyway to the pipe entrance.  

I could hear his heavy panting behind me. "Where are we going?" he gasped out. 

"Almost there." I dropped to my knees to yank off the manhole cover and swing myself inside, gripping onto the ladder and gesturing him in. He nodded wildly, following suit once I scooted down enough for him to have room. "Cover it up, you idiot!"  

"Oh. Sor-." He sounded like he was going to apologize, but he was too breathless to finish his sentence, so he just reached around and grabbed the cover, shifted it into place above his head until there was a metallic clank and we were shrouded in darkness.  

I pressed my back against the wall, catching my breath, waiting until my heart didn't feel like it was literally gonna smash through my ribcage and vibrate on the floor. Adrenaline still in my veins was making my hands overly shaky, as I had a ton of energy in me that I currently didn't have use for. Sweat drenched me, making my clothes cling to my frame and hair a wet, clumpy mop. I heard Marco doing the same next to me. 

At one point I hacked up a gob of dry, goopy saliva and spat it on the floor, bending over to rest with my hands on my knees before shaking my head and standing slowly back up, supporting myself against the wall because I still felt a little lightheaded. "...Hh...fuck." 

"...Thank y- ah!" Call it habit of mine, but Marco didn't get to finish his sentence because I socked him in the cheek. A loud whimper rang out and I saw him stumble back as my eyes adjusted to the dark, my eyes narrowed to a hardened glare. He clutched his cheek, eyes squeezed shut in pain. "Ow!" 

"That's for trying to kill me, you fuck," I hissed venomously, then brought my leg up to kick him square in the chest. He screeched as he fell backwards onto the hard, wet stone underfoot, no doubt his skull ricocheting off it. He didn't move from there, curling up miserably, but I really didn't feel sympathy. "Look. I owed you my life, so now we're even. 'Kay? I'm just gonna get on with my life, and you get on with yours." 

"I...I-I didn't- I didn't try to kill you." 

"Yes you did, shut up," I muttered back, rolling my eyes. "Don't get under the impression I didn't figure out what you were gonna do when I was in that water trench thing. I think you are full of shit." I kicked him again, just for good measure, and he yelped weakly. "Now get up." 

Marco laid still for a moment, before slowly picking himself up to prop up on his hands and knees, though I could spot his limbs shaking. His head hung between his arms. "And you know what?" He hacked and spat in turn, and I assumed it was saliva with hopefully blood. "When I was ordered to kill you, I didn't. I let you go with nothing but one request- you never return, or they'd kill us both. Just one request! And you had to come back, you had to be seen, you had to screw this up for the both of us." He whipped his head around to me, anger burning in his eyes. "I wanted this to end peacefully and this is your fault! I just lost everything because of you, how dare  _you_  lash out at  _me_!" I bent forward to snap at him, but he got up to his knees and threw his fists behind them, little sparks beginning to twist off his fingertips. "What business could you possibly have in Sina so urgent you had to come back?" 

"You don't need to know," I snarled. 

"Yes, I do! Who are you?" 

I stayed quiet. 

"Who are you?" 

"Eren," I said instantly, not wanting to give him any information. 

His eyes narrowed. "That's not your name." 

"What?" I growled. "Your genetic mod come with a lie detector?" 

"Tell me your name." 

"Armin." 

"Tell me your name." 

"Connie." 

"Tell me your name!" 

"My name is Jean!" The yell breached my lips and bounced around the pipe, and he got quiet. I gritted my teeth and clenched my fists, digging by fingernails into my palms.  

Marco let a silence drag on between us, before dipping his head in a slow nod. "That's a name I can believe." He pushed himself up to his feet. "My name is-" 

"Marco." His eyebrows shot up. "Marco, or...Bodt. I heard guards talking." 

"Bodt is my last name," he said gently. "But yes, my name is Marco." 

I didn't really care. "Good for you." I leaned on the pipe side. "Fine. Sorry. Happy?" He didn't respond and I groaned. Picky bitch. "Whatever. Look.  I'm gonna go my way, and you go yours. Good luck." I began walking down the pipe.  

"Wait!" Fuck me. I turned around, glaring. 

"What? What do you want?" 

Marco opened his mouth, then closed it, sitting down with his legs criss-crossed and licking his lips nervously. "U-uh. I understand that you don't like me, but. Please don't just leave me." I raised an eyebrow, and he swallowed and looked down further. "I'm sorry. I don't know where to go now. I-I don't know how to survive on my own." I kept staring. "You...probably think that's kind of pathetic-" 

"Good guess," I interjected. 

"-but I mean I lived in the palace my whole life. I have no idea how to deal with being a fugitive." 

I furrowed my brows at him. "What exactly are you askin'?" 

Marco rose to his feet again, nervously twisting his hands. He wouldn't meet my eyes. "...Can I come with you?" 

"No." 

"Please!" he begged. "I won't cause you trouble, I promise! I'm sorry, I am, but now I don't have anywhere else to go!" 

"No." I turned around and started walking. "Nothing's in it for me." 

"Sina!" he burst out. I turned around, glaring. "S-Sina! I know Sina." He paused. "You have something to do in Sina, right? I know it better than anyone. And- and the palace." 

My eyes widened. "Would you help me, then? If I take you with me, will you help me?" 

He nodded quickly. 

I considered my options. 

One, leave this asshole here to fend for himself and keep walking and nothing changes. Okay. 

Two, take this asshole with me and everything changes. ...But this asshole knows Sina. This asshole knows the palace.  

Okay. 

I sucked in a breath, curling a fist and banging it against my forehead, punishing myself in advance for what I was about to say. "Fine. You can come with me." 

He gasped loudly, clasping his hands together. "Thank you! I won't-" 

"I still don't like you though," I muttered. "So don't get the impression that we're friends now, got it?" 

"Yes. I'm not totally sure how fond of you I am, either."  

"Good." I sniffed and looked down the pipe. "First we need to get you new clothes, if we're going incognito. That dumb getup dead gives away you're a guard." 

"It's not dumb!" he protested. "It represents-" 

"Shut up, I'm talking. We only have a matter of time before 'Wanted' posters and alerts and that shit goes out, so we need to do it fast before the whole population is after us. Not to mention if the wall guards catch our scent, we're dead. Are you getting this?" He nodded, wide-eyed. "We're criminals now, you and me. The nutjob with impossible abilities who broke into the palace, and the guard who let him live." 

I watched his gaze sink to the ground and hands come up to his head, eyes wide. "Criminals," he squeaked in repetition.  "I can't believe I'm...I was always so good." 

"That's what got you in trouble," I muttered, starting to walk down, looking over my shoulder. "You comin', Bodt?" 

He nodded and trotted up behind me. "Where are we going?" 

"Rose. Trost, specifically. It's the only route in these pipes I know." 

His mouth fell open. "You're from Rose?" 

I quirked an eyebrow at him. "Do I look like I'm part of your dingy unicorn crew?" 

"Well, no, but...if you're not from Sina, how do you have powers?" 

I frowned at him, squinting. "You've never been outside Sina, have you?" He shook his head. "That's what I thought. Look, Bodt, there's more people with powers in this world than your little groupie." 

"What?" he sputtered. "You have genetic modifications in the further regions?" 

"'Regions'? Oh, just say 'walls', you pretentious shit. And no. It's inherited from guards having kids with peasants a hundred years ago- why do you think the King had the walls erected in the first place?" 

Marco flapped his jaw, unable to respond. 

I grunted and stuck my hands in my pockets. "Any other dumb questions while we're at it?" 

He stayed quiet, the light flush of his cheeks giving away his embarrassment. "No." 

I stared at him, then looked forward, guiding him down the pipes. "Good. Then keep walking and stop talking." I had a feeling I was going to be saying that a lot. 

* * *

 I cannot believe a worker of the most dickheaded position I could imagine would press harder about morality than me. 

"It's stealing!" he said as I plucked slightly damp clothes hanging off a line. I knew the family they belonged to, the Wagners, but I also knew they were at church right now, and so taking the clothes really had no risk. 

I took off a shirt and threw it back at Marco. "Stealing's kinda harsh. These guys are family friends, and besides, this is for your benefit." 

Marco was teetering side to side, unbalanced by the heavy pile of clothes I threw into his arms. "I don't want to steal!" 

"You don't want to fight, can't kill, bitch about stealing? God, your goody-two-shoes-ness is going to make me hurl." I grabbed another pair of slacks and tossed them behind my shoulder for him to catch. "Keep in mind that it's actually dangerous for you to be in that silver outfit, and that this is actually really important if we wanna survive under cover." 

He whimpered behind me. "Can't we just buy clothes? Or ask to borrow some?" 

"Oh for fuck's sake, would you quit complaining about every little thing I do? How about you do that? 'Kay? 'Kay."  

Marco quieted down, as he better have.  

We hadn't been together very long- it's really only been two hours- but he hadn't really caused me a  _tremendous_ amount of trouble, yet. He was fussy about what I do, which bugged the hell outta me, but we hadn't attacked each other. This alliance was tentative, though. If he stood in my way for a single goddamn moment he was getting lightning in the gut.  

"Go get changed," I mumbled gruffly. "Pick an outfit out of that." 

Marco blinked at me as I turned around to face him, then stared down at the clothes in his arms. "...Where am I going to change?"  

"We're in the fenced in backyard, they're at church, just change right there. Nobody's watching." 

The tip of his tongue darted out to moisten his lips, and he gently set the pile of clothes down, sifting through them and picking out a shirt and pants and setting them aside. He reached down to tug off one boot, then the other. I chewed my lip as I watched him slide off the jacket of his uniform, then reach his hands up to unbutton his silver shirt underneath, one by one, until it was loose enough to slip off his shoulders. Under his shirt was a freckle-splattered toned body, which kind of worried me. I didn't want to get into a fight with him again if he was ripped. Under his rib cage I saw a faint light purple line, faded into his skin tone but still just raised enough for it to be visible. It was thin and jagged, unusual in every way. I frowned, gesturing. "What's that?" 

"Huh?" Marco looked down at where I was pointing and smiled sheepishly. "Ah. Training accident from a couple years ago. It was shirts versus skin, and I was skin, and...lightning leaves a mark on bare skin. And I'm actually pretty lucky it wasn't worse." 

The boy with a lightning shaped scar. That sounded like it could be a bestseller.  Nonetheless, I grimaced, not liking to think about it. "Does it hurt?" 

"Well, not...not- not anymore, no."  

I stared at it, then my eyes moving as movement interested them to his fingers going down to tug at the clasp of his pants. I snapped my head up at him clearing his throat, and he tipped his head at me. "Sorry, do you mind?" 

I wasn't even aware that I was staring, but, now embarrassed as well, shove my hands in my pockets and turn around to put my back to him. Shit, did he think I was staring? I wondered briefly if I was giving the wrong impression, but then I remembered that just two hours ago I had punched him, kicked him, kicked him again, and I let out a sigh of relief. Nah. I was fine.  

I heard the rustling of clothes behind me, Marco quickly saying, "Just a second," and then a minute or two later he was telling me I could look.  

I spun back around. ...Oh. Okay. That could work. 

Marco was decked in a form-fitting ivory button up with a cream felt jacket thrown over it, collar popped up and dark buttons glinting. A deeply brown scarf was wrapped around his neck, and black jeans and combat boots like mine adorned his lower half.  

And black gloves. The dude had to accessorize.  

He tugged a little on the jacket to adjust it before smiling broadly at me. "Is this alright?"  

It was a little weird, because I remember Thomas wearing that jacket and now a dude I just beat up was wearing it, but better that than the silver abomination. "Yeah. You look fine." 

"Not like a guard?" 

"Just a regular asshole in a scarf. C'mon." I turned and began trotting off. 

Marco ran up to my side. "Could you please be a little nicer? We're allied now, and it's common decency." 

I rolled my eyes. "Yeah. Not letting the 'tried to kill me' thing slide."   

"You were after the King!" 

"I was  _not_  after the King!" I wheeled around angrily, stomping my foot hard on the ground. "God, we've been over this! I wouldn't touch that sack of shit with a ten foot pole!" 

"Then what did you want?" Marco snapped sharply.  

I stared at him, then shook my head. "It doesn't matter. It's not real." 

Marco scowled. "If it's not real, why were you pursuing it? Twice?" 

"It's-! It's complicated, okay?" I gesticulated wildly as if it'd help get my point across. "Look, there's these two guys- these two family friends, okay, and- and they want me to go get something but I don't even think it's real, but it's what my dad would've wanted but he's not here anymore, and-" 

"Blonde," whispered Marco suddenly, eyes round discs, and I frowned. "One is blonde, one is short with black hair, and the third had dark brown hair." 

"...Yeah, I-" I blinked. "Yeah?" 

"You're _their_  accomplices?" he sputtered, reeling back. "They've been attacking the palace for years!" 

"I know! I know, and they're hurt, so they sent me in their place," I said, voice growing agitated.  

"They're terrible!" he cried. "I can't believe you work with them! Do you know how many of us they've injured? Do you know how much destruction they've caused trying to get the Box? In all the years we've only managed to catch one of them, and he was assassinated as he rightly should've been." 

"That man was my _father!_ " I was screaming before I realized I was, and leaping forward to shoot a bolt of lightning in his shoulder. Marco squealed of pain, stumbling back, but straightened right back up to blast a bolt to me that just barely grazed my side as I dodged. I was seeing red, utterly and completely  _furious_ , shaking with rage as I lashed out at him with more lighting. "He was a great man!" I roared. "Don't you dare ever say he deserved his death! Shut up, shut up, shut up!" 

I raised my hand the same time as he did, and just as it had in the palace, our beams of lightning collided and sparked wildly where they met, but I growled and pushed my hand forward, and the sparks flew down the line towards Marco. Marco's eyes widened and he stepped back, rolling away, and I followed, bounding forward to tackle him in my fit of rage. My feet left the ground and I was pinning him to the ground, but before I could move, his hands were on my shoulders and I was jerked as he suddenly threw his weight to one side and flipped us over, which made me thrash and cry out. He clamped my hands down to the ground, which restrained me from clawing his face or something, but didn't restrain me from flicking my wrists and shooting another bolt of electricity into his other shoulder. He yelped, and his grip weakened, which granted me the opportunity to lodge my foot in his stomach and violently kick him off of me, splayed back-first on the ground. He began to get up again but he was too late, as I was already on top of him again, pinning him in a way that would make escape exceedingly difficult. 

I glowered down at him, my fist striking across his jaw. "You filthy slimeballs took him away from me!" Again. "My mother cried for days and days!" Again. "He was trying to do humanity right and you  _killed him!_ And you dare say it like you're proud!" My hands shot forward to curl around his throat, the adrenaline in my veins making me quiver. "I'm going to fucking kill you!" 

Marco let out a breathless choking noise, hand groping around before it latched onto mine, trying to wrench them off. When I didn't budge and instead tightened my grip, he let his lip curl in a snarl and his hands shot up to my hair. He suddenly yanked down, which would've been painful enough if he hadn't crashed my skull into his in a hard headbutt. I yowled and shot up, hands shooting to my forehead where it was suddenly throbbing, and a fist struck me across my cheekbone and I teetered and fell off of him. I cried out and kicked wildly, but arched up with pain as crackling lightning shot into my shin. A hand fisted in my hair and I was harshly pulled up to a sitting position, hands clenched into fists.  

"I can't let you get the Box." With our foreheads touching, our eyes bore into each other as if trying to burn into each other's sockets and he snarled out the words lowly. "I won't let you get Pandora's Box if that's what you're after." 

"We have a deal, bucko," I hissed scratchily in return.  

His eyes narrowed. "I've been a guard all my life. I will prevent you from disrupting His Majesty's privacy, deal or no deal." 

"So are we not gonna work, then?" I spat sarcastically.  

"You're a criminal." 

"So are you." 

"I'm not like you." He released me, and I fell back, coughing. "I'm a criminal because my moral conscious told me that it was wrong to kill you. Apparently, you don't posses the same asset."  

I glared up at him. "Go fuck yourself." My blood still boiled beneath my skin, and more than ever I wanted to tear him to pieces. "Were you present when he was killed?" 

His jaw clenched. "Yes. But I didn't kill him, that wasn't me." 

"Who killed him?" 

Marco swallowed hard, shaking his head. "You wouldn't know him. He left the guards years ago, we don't know what happened to him." 

My hand fisted in the fabric of the front of his shirt. "A name, Marco." 

Marco squeezed his eyes shut. "Nile Dawk." 

I dropped Marco. 

I spun slowly around with large, unblinking eyes. 

Sparks flew from my fingertips. 

With a scream, I shoved them into the ground, and a charred a circle of grass around me until it was black. 

* * *

Believe me when I say I'm not actually an idiot. 

I'm actually pretty smart, I promise. 

I'm...impulsive? Not good at keeping myself restrained, verbally or physically, never have been. 

So, that's why the story so far has really been an unfortunate series of me making really dumbass decisions. Impulsiveness. 

And I guess I'm not really helping my case to say, but the whole finding-out-my-boss-killed-my-dad-then-flipping-out-and-burning-the-grass thing was...another one of those instances, that I could've thought through better.  

That sorta attracts attention? Which is...what we were trying really hard not to do? 

There was a little road nearby the Wagner's yard, which- unfortunately- a young couple was strolling down. And if the lightning didn't get their attention, my scream did. Their heads snapped up and over at me squatting in a crater of burnt earth, punching electrified fists into the ground as Marco yelled at me to calm down. 

I was made painfully aware of just how terrifyingly fast word gets around when they pointed and shouted, "It's them! The outcasts from Sina!" Well, at least they had the decency to just shout it out and alert Marco and I we were spotted as opposed to doing it silently.  

In a flash, Marco was running over and hoisting me to my feet, pulling me along like I had to him as we sprinted past the couple. From there, I ran until I was in front, grabbing his wrist and leading him in a winding pathway to somewhere I hoped would be safe. I knew these lands better than anyone- so I yanked him along, through thick overgrowth and bush, to the forest I had played in as a child, and I finally stopped running as I pressed my back against a totally charred tree and wheezed. "Here," I gasped. "It's safe here. They're not gonna find us here." 

"We can't stay here forever," panted Marco next to me. "We'll still need to make trips to get food and water and things like that, won't we?" 

I craned my head around the tree, just to be double-triple-extra sure we weren't being followed. "Yeah, yeah, stocking up is not the first thing on my mind right now though." I turned back towards him. "We're camping out here for...until it's safe not to, though."  _Never._  

Marco gulped and looked over to me. "No, I don't like that idea." 

"What? Scared of touching dirt, palace guard?" 

"I'm actually quite scared of you killing me in my sleep." 

I turned my head towards him, silent as my eyes fell upon him because he looked so utterly terrified and I could tell he was being completely serious.  

He was genuinely afraid I'd murder him. 

I blinked slowly at him, tongue tip swiping over my lips, shaking my head as I looked down. "No," I whispered. "I'm not going to kill you. You couldn't kill me 'cause you were scared, right? 'Cause when it comes to that, you're a coward?" He tensely nodded. "Yeah. Well." I looked up at the sky. "Me too." 

I don't have the heart to actually kill anybody, I don't think. Unless it was absolutely dire in the situation. But it'd fuck me up, it really would. 

Marco must've been holding his breath, for the deep exhale he let out. "Really?" 

"Yeah. That's the main reason. But, I guess you could get deeper? Lost my dad when I was just a teenager, so if you want to, I guess you could say that I was exposed to the cruelty of the world fairly young and don't want to be a part of that. I know how it feels to lose someone at the hands of someone else, and I don't want to ever be the cause of that." 

I slunk down the tree until my ass hit the ground, and Marco mirrored the action next to me. I looked over at him. "I still hate you. A lot, actually. But unless I absolutely have to for whatever reason, I'm not going to kill you." 

"Thank you, I guess," he said quietly, hugging his knees to his chest. "I won't kill you unless the situation calls for it either." 

My eyes lulled upwards. "What if the situation is taking Pandora's Box?" 

"I'll fight you. Jean, I'm not letting you have the Box." 

I tipped my head to look over at him, eyes narrowed. "So the Box. The Box is real. You're telling me it's real." He blinked at me. "You're telling me the enchanted cube from Greek mythology is real, in the palace, and you're prepared to fight me to the death over it. Do you listen to yourself speak?" 

"I don't- I don't think it's _the_  box from Greek mythology, as it's...uh...mythology." 

My brows furrowed, a soft crease appearing in my forehead as I studied him quizzically. "How much do you know about it?" 

Instantly his eyes went large, shaking his head and starting to scoot himself away to put distance between us. "Not much, I don't know mu-" 

"How much do you know?" I asked more firmly, gaze sharpening to a glare as I slowly moved back over to him. 

He held up his hands, shaking them frantically. "Nothing more! I swear!" 

"Yes you do!" I barked. "Tell me!" 

"I-I don't! I've never been inside the vault for it, His Majesty has that strictly off limits! He takes it out a couple times a month, b-but most of us aren't even allowed to see it! Please let go of me!"  

I was unaware I had backed him up and pinned him up against the tree, teeth bared in a grimace, until he was squirming and asking me to release him. I shakily breathed out and let go of his jacket, crossing my arms. I breathed out, shutting my eyes. "Fine," I murmured. I opened my eyes again and sent them skyward, peering up at the overcast through the branches of the tree, squinting. "So you've never seen the Box? Don't even know what it does?" 

I looked back over to him rapidly shaking his head. "I have no idea, honestly, I don't." He bites his lower lip. "I mean...about what you were saying earlier. If something so infamous is it's namesake, I'd imagine it has some sort of connection to the thing from mythology, whatever it does." 

I quirked an eyebrow. "You know the story?" 

"Of course. Zeus gave Pandora a box and told her that never, in any circumstances, should she open it, but, ah. Needless to say, curiosity got the best of her, and when she opened it, all the bad in the world was released. But there was hope in the bottom, too, so it wasn't  _all_ bad, I guess." 

"...Hm." I blinked. "Wonder what that could mean. I don't think he has vials full of disease and slander or whatever in there. Honestly, what makes a tiny little box so highly guarded? And why do Erwin and Levi want it so bad?" 

"What?" 

"Shit. Sorry, thinking aloud, don't pay attention to me." I folded my arms and puffed out a breath from my cheeks, pacing around in a small circle. 

Marco was frowning at me. "Jean?" 

"What?" 

He paused. "Did you go get the Box because you wanted to?" 

I stopped pacing to frown at him. "What? Because I wanted t- I'm sorry, do I look crazy? Do I look like a madman to you?" 

"Well, you do have the look of a crazed criminal in your eye, but that's not the point." I snorted indignantly. "What made you go and try to get it?"  

"I told you," I said, irritated. "Two family friends told me to." 

Marco hummed and shook his head. "Hm, no. Not the answer I'm looking for." 

"What do you want me to say?" I struck and pose a mockingly took on a high falsetto. "I wanted to good because I'm Jean Kirschtein the boy scout!" I relaxed again and glared, voice returning to normal. "No." 

"No, I mean...did you do it simply because they asked?" I frowned at him. "You didn't immediately agree to take me with you because you said there wasn't anything in it for you, so I'm going to assume that's how you operate. They must've offered you something in return." 

He was smart. He was smart and I didn't like that. He was staring at me with these big, brown eyes as he patiently waited for my answer because he knew he was right. I gritted my teeth. "Why do you want to know?" 

"Because you've single-handedly ruined my life, and I at least want to know it wasn't in vain." 

There was a feasible stretch of silence, then I breathed out and slumped back down against the tree to sit next to him. "...They promised me a life in the interior," I said quietly.  

"You...you did that just to live in-?" 

"You don't get it. You don't get what it's like to live in sickness and poverty. You've lived in privilege your entire life, and you don't know how desperate all the rest of us are." I hugged my knees to my chest and rested my chin on them. "Look, it's- it's hard out there. And for the exchange of just a box, I thought it was something I could do." 

Marco was silent. 

I tapped my forehead to my knees and sighed. "And a letter," I mumbled. "A letter from my dad, saying that he'd want me to continue with his work, and I don't want to disappoint him." 

"...You know," he came softly. "I became a guard so I wouldn't disappoint my dad, either." 

I stayed like that, clutching my knees with my face buried in them, and let out a shuddering breath. "Hey, Marco." He made a small noise, alerting me that he heard me. "You told me earlier that my father's killer was a man named Nile Dawk." 

"Yeah. What about it?" 

I breathed in deeply through my nose. "I know the foul bastard." 

I looked up to Marco's eyes wide and round, mouth open in an 'O'. "You know him?" he sputtered. "How? Wh- where did he go?" 

I gritted my teeth, jerking my head towards the direction of town. His eyes got even bigger. "Right here in town," I hissed. "Hiding like the sick bastard he is, and having the  _nerve_ to tell me off for using  _my_ powers in public when he used to use his to kill!" 

"When did he tell you that?" 

I laughed dryly, shaking my head. A light, unbelieving smile was on my lips, although my eyes were narrowed in a sharp, burning glare. "I work for him."  

His brow furrowed, eyes squinting as his face scrunched up. "How the hell do you work for him?" 

"He doesn't recognize me as my dad's son. Probably never woulda thought. But at any rate." I turned towards my new reluctant accomplice, teeth bared. "You and I are going into Trost tomorrow, Bodt. We can get supplies, pick up that guard uniform that you left at the Wagner's. And then we're gonna go find the headquarters of Rose Electricity Incorporated and we're going to beat the shit out of my boss." 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> holy hell this chapter was a lot of fun to write omg  
> so jean and marco on the run together as fugitives!! lots of fun. course they hate each other so thats certainly a thing (CAN I JUST SAY ENEMY DYNAMIC IS SO FUN TO WRITE WOW)  
> PLEASE LOOK AT THESE TWO BEAUTIFUL PIECeS OF FAN ART OH MY GOD [HERE](http://hachidraws.tumblr.com/post/87123418142/electrifying-boyfrens-are-coming-head-to-head-in) AND [HERE](http://greenalms.tumblr.com/post/87778064431/pandoras-box-by-the-lovely-flint-from-last)  
> so yeah. hope you enjoy this chapter! thank you so much for reading, and kudos and hits and comments (ESPECIALLY COMMENTS WOW) really really motivate me to keep going. thank you so much!!  
> ([tumblr](http://jeankirstchein.tumblr.com/))


	4. Employee of the Month

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Have you ever really wanted to kick your boss in the balls?  
> Especially because they- I don't know, like- killed one of your parents, or something?

I never wanted to be on a 'Wanted' poster to begin with. But least of all did I want it to be this goddamned  _insulting._  

Gnashing my teeth together, I reached a hand up to yank at the paper and sharply pulled it down, making it tear around the pin that was attaching it to the bulletin board. I held up the paper in front of my face, biting back a snarl at the crude drawing of some ugly dude maybe vaguely resembling me penciled in on it. "This is a joke. It's a joke." I looked at Marco. "My hair doesn't look like that." 

Marco stared at his own poster beside me, pinching his chin in his thumb and index finger and then sighing. "We have bigger issues than your hair." 

"Easy for you to say," I murmured angrily, turning over the sign in my hands. "Yours looks fine." 

I heard him exhale loudly. "Well, yeah, I've worked with all of them for years. They all know what I look like better than a five minute glance-and-draw- but Jean, really, our problems here lie in the fact that these  _exist._ " 

"Yeah. And we've gotta make them un-exist." I gritted my teeth, twisted my wrists and pulled, splitting the sheet right in half, tearing apart the uglyass mug posed for mine and the 'Wanted: Palace Intruder. Believed to Have Business in Harming His Majesty, The King. Very Dangerous, Has Possibly Illegal Electric Genetic Modifications. Reward. Dead or Alive' printed underneath it. "For God's sake, I don't want anything to do with that bastard you guys prop up on a throne and line up to lick his toes!" 

"Well, they wouldn't know that," counteracted Marco quietly, slowly tearing apart his own poster. "And you know that going after Pandora's Box is just as bad, right?" His voice rose into an almost sharply defensive tone, subtly reminding me that he still wasn't on board with the idea.  

I rolled my eyes and stuffed the paper shreds into my pocket. "Fuck you, I'm getting the Box." 

"No you're not." 

"Yes I am." 

He shook his head. "We're here for other purposes. Your personal purposes, may I add, so can we please not argue and get to that?" 

That better have been his nearly black eye talking. 

He was right, though. We were in Trost then, in front of the bulletin board in the middle of town on our way to tear Nile Dawk a third asshole- his first one being physical and his second one being his personality. As promised, I took my reluctant tag-along into my hometown for supplies and my own aforementioned personal reasons. I was a fugitive, yeah, but there, I felt relatively low-risk for a couple reasons. One, the posters weren't up for long, and we tore them down before anyone else could see so it was unlikely most people knew anyway. Two, with the exception of a few racist grandmas who hollered at me during street shows that the government would have my head if they ever found me, the people of this town adored me, especially the kids. So walking among the townsfolk who looked up to me was no problem. But disguise was never a bad idea, either. So third, I had scuffed up my hair into a different style and covered it with a black hat I stole from the Wagner's and changed into a white shirt with a black vest and a cape-like coat around my shoulders. I'd much rather my comfortable leather jacket and cotton shirt, but it was all about survival. Although, like I said, if I was recognized through it, then it would probably be by someone who knew me and wasn't a threat. 

Marco, in terms of being spotted, was no threat whatsoever. No one would recognize him, and he didn't look like a guard. Just some tall guy in a cream trench coat with a dark scarf. Really, our only worry was Thomas spotting us.  

I sighed and stared at the shreds of paper in my palm, then scowled and clenched my fist and shoved them into my pocket. "Okay. Let's start moving. We don't have very far to go at all, but I don't know. I feel uneasy about being out after dark." 

Marco nodded and tore his own poster, placing it in his pocket accordingly. "Right." 

I turned on heel and motion him over and we started walking down the sidewalk, trying not to make eye contact with passerbyers.  

Marco was quiet, looking around and surveying the area as we walked. "Rose Electric is the place we're looking for, right?" he asked softly. 

"Yeah," I grunted back. "It's not like we're really looking for it, I know exactly where it is. We'll be there in ten minutes or less." He didn't respond, and I frowned over at him. "What?" 

He wasn't even looking at me, craning his head around. "Nothing," he said. "It's just weird. This is like Sina, but...um. Not." 

I sighed. "Yeah. It's a shithole." 

"No! That's not what I-!" 

"Yeah, it was," I muttered flatly. I quirked an eyebrow at him when we made eye contact. "Look, I'm not taking offense. I know it's dirty and dingy and stuff, and especially compared to where you come from. I've always known that. Life sucks out here." 

Marco gnawed at his lower lip, then looked around again. "The people are so thin," he whispered. His voice was nearly tinged with...guilt.  

"Of course. We're all starving." His head snapped back over to me, eyes wide with something of alarm. "We don't get any more food than you guys in Sina sell us, and it's way overpriced as it is. And most of us don't have the jobs to pay it off. I'm one of the lucky ones." 

"What?" he asked, stunned. "Why?" 

"Because I have a job, are you listeni-?" I began. 

He shook his head. "No, why is it so poor here and then in Sina it's so...?" 

My eyes narrowed into a glare at him. "I don't know," I spat. "Why don't you tell me?" And suddenly, I was annoyed at him all over again. He was so privileged and always had been and it wasn't fucking fair.  

His head bent down, like a dog getting yelled at. "I'm sorry," he said. "I didn't know. I assumed the other two walls were like Sina." 

We ducked out of the way of a vaguely familiar woman with two kids trailing behind her, and I grimaced. "Don't you dare give me some 'Let them eat cake' speech here," I hissed. "You all come from fucking paradise and we're all dropping off like flies over here. Couple of my friends from school wouldn't show up one day, turns out they caught a disease and Mom and Dad couldn't afford the medicine for it, you know."  

My fists were clenched and I bit my tongue to stop from screaming at him with the anger boiling in my stomach that I tried to keep to a simmer as to not cause a scene. When he spoke again, his voice was tight. "I'm sorry," he repeated. "I'm sorry." He was silent for a beat. "I can understand why you hate Sina so much, then." 

"It was always envy," I said in a hushed tone. "I always wanted to live there. I wanted a better life for myself, I told you, that was part of why I went to get the Box in the first place. It wasn't until I got there that I realized how sickening it all was." 

And then we didn't say anything for a while.  

In fact, we didn't really speak at all until we got there. 

I pushed open the old, creaky door of Rose Electric, the small brass bell hanging just above it letting off a soft, melodic  _ting_ in announcement of our arrival. I poked my head inside, eyes flicking around the front lobby. A desk sat in front of us, tended by three of my co-workers of three distinct hair colors all with their heads bent down and mumbling to themselves. At the bell chiming, their heads raised in unison. 

The one with bright blonde hair at chin length and large blue eyes jumped from being startled, but quickly settled into a soft smile. "Hi, Jean! Can I help you?" 

Eren was standing next to him, hands on his hips and forehead creased in a frown. "I thought you were taking the weekend off?" 

"You are," murmured the woman next to him, her black tresses of silk curling around her shoulder, dark hazel eyes scanning the clipboard in her hand before looking up at me through thick, dark lashes. 

I smiled squeamishly, although I tried not to and tried to look cool in front of this  _really gorgeous_ lady. "Hi, guys. Hi, Mikasa." 

She made a noise of acknowledgement, which was an improvement in our relationship. I was going places. 

"What are you doing here?" inquired Eren, simultaneous with Armin asking, "Who's that?" and gesturing to Marco. 

I wetted my lips and turned to Marco, expecting him to be nervous and staring at me because what the hell were we supposed to tell him, but Marco was beaming comfortingly at them and waving. "Hello!" he greeted, completely naturally. "My name is Maxime. I'm a family friend of Jean's, visiting from the other side of Rose. He's told me all about you three- it's a pleasure!" 

I watched with eyes as round and wide as small planets as Marco smiled pleasantly and leaned forward on the desk, shaking hands with each of them, to their visible delight. Wait, he- what-  _Maxime_ _?_  

"Nice to meet you, Maxime. I'm Armin," chirped Armin, who then glanced over at me. "Is he why you're taking the couple of days off, Jean?" 

"Uh," I sputtered.  

"It is," replied Marco, talking as if we were truly friends and weren't trying to spill each other's blood the day before. "He just wanted to introduce me. And you all seem to be a lovely group of people!" He was all sunshine and sweetness and all three were totally fooled. Which pissed me off.  

I grunted and stepped up to the desk, nudging Marco off-center with my shoulder. "Where's Nile? Me and-" I tensed and placed a hand on Marco's shoulder as lightly as I could, biting my tongue. "- _Maxy_  here want to say hi."  

Armin expectantly raised his eyebrows at Mikasa, who looked down to the clipboard to check his schedule, but Eren waved his hand. "He's got a client down with the Carolinas. You can stop by and see him, if you want." 

I swallowed and looked at Armin, who shared my expression of discomfort. "Uh, Eren, he might not want to." 

With Mikasa going over to get a cup of coffee, Armin looked at me nervously and leaned in to cup his hand to Eren's ear and whisper I dated the daughter in the Carolina family, Mina, but that ended horribly and we both knew it'd be really awkward for me to go back. "When is he done?" I asked, not really keen on the idea of barging into my ex-girlfriend's house and pounding the snot out of the guy fixing her lightbulbs. 

Eren didn't actually know that one, so Mikasa swiped a gander at her master schedule. "In a couple minutes," she replied. 

"Ah." I'd wait until then. I glanced to my right, seeing the other three at the other end of the desk and preoccupied with chatter, so I took my opportunity and offered a sheepish smile to Mikasa. "Hi." 

She raised an eyebrow. 

I swallowed hard. "Um. I-I know I already greeted you, so greeting you again might be weird, I just never said it to you personally. You know." 

"...Yeah," she said slowly. "Hi." 

An awkward pause, and I gnawed my lower lip. "Uh," I began, trying again. "S-so. Uh, so. How's your week been going?" 

Mikasa seemed more interested in her mug of coffee than me. "Fine." 

"Cool," I said back too quickly. "That's great. My week has been kind of fine, too. I mean, not too much. Parts of it have not been good. But overall fine." 

"Good." She sounded bored.  

Sweat beaded at my forehead. "Sorry if I'm bothering you," I babbled anxiously. "I don't mean to be. I just don't know how...how to...t-talk to people with- with-" 

She quirked an eyebrow and looked up at me. "With?" 

I let my mouth hang open for a second, trying to formulate the least embarrassing answer possible. Attractive features? Estrogen? Breasts? "Uh. With, um. Pretty..."  _Don't fuck up don't fuck up don't_  "...hair." _I fucked up._  

She stared hard at me and I just gave her an empty smile as I felt like I wanted to curl up somewhere and die. "Oh." She glanced back down to her clipboard, absentmindedly clicking a pen in her other hand. "Thanks." 

"...Okay." Pressing my tongue hard to the back of my teeth, I turned my head to look down because the fact that the chatter at the  other end of the desk had gone silent caught my attention. Eren, Armin and Marco were all leaned in together, grinning at me, vibrating with the strain of keeping quiet. But as soon as my eyes landed on them, they all simultaneously burst into loud laughter, hunching over the table and slamming their fists against it as they cackled. 

My cheeks burned and I was considering literally walking into Sina and turning myself in so they could kill me and get this over with. I gulped and bowed my head in embarrassment because this was a fucking trainwreck and those three were getting a kick out of it. "Alright, we're going now," I mumbled, which made them all hoot with laughter even harder. I scowled and stomped my foot. "I said we're going now!" I repeated louder, and they all wheezed. "Nile is done by now, and we're gonna go pay him a visit. Come on, Marco." 

I didn't realize my blunder until Eren and Armin's laughter began to dwindle and slow, and they frowned at me. "Marco?" repeated Eren. "Thought his name was Maxime." 

Marco's eyes widened, and it clicked that he lied about his name because if they saw it on a poster, considering the picture beneath and the poster would be next to one for me then it wouldn't be that hard to put two and two together. "It is," I sputtered rapidly. "His name is Maxime. Sorry. Marco, Maxime, I meant to say Maxime. I was thinking about my old dog named Marco, and- you know. Anyway, me and Maxime have to go now, but it was nice seeing all of you." 

I wasn't sure how much they believed me, but they had no reason to be actually suspicious of anything, so they gave dismissive waves and I grabbed Marco's sleeve and pulled him out of the store. "Goodbye!" he chirped at them before I yanked him outside and slammed the door. The bell rung out, a sharp noise against the heavily quiet air. We travel down the sidewalk until we're a good couple of meters from the store entrance before I let go. 

Marco made an irritated sound as he tore his arm away from me. "Geez, can we go an hour without you nearly pulling my arm out of it's socket? Please? Can we  _try_ that?" 

"Maxime?" I asked, letting go of him and shoving my hands in my pockets. 

Marco shrugged. "It's my little brother's name. I needed a cover." 

I frowned at him. "You have a little brother?" 

He smiled and rubbed the back of his neck. "Three. And a little sister, but, um. That's not important. But you know what is?" 

"A lot of things, what specifically?" 

And then Marco was clutching his stomach as he doubled over, hollering with laughter as a huge grin cracked his face. "You flirting!" he wheezed. "That'show you flirt? Oh my god! That was horrible!" 

I grunted heavily and balled my hands into fists, clenching my fists as my cheeks seared crimson. "Shut the fuck up." He laughed harder. "Shut up! Can you not? Seriously, stop. Shut up. Now. I knew I shouldn't have fucking let you come with me, I knew this was a bad idea." 

Marco shook his head and giggled. "Sorry, sorry." He let out a last couple breathy chuckles then shook his head. "Alright. So. Um...the...Carolinas, right?" He turned from me slightly, scratching the back of his hair. "Where's that?" 

"Little down the road then turn left at the corner section of Pain and Regret," I grunted. 

Marco frowned.  "What's wrong? Is the family bad?" 

I bared my teeth as we turned and went down the divergent road that led to the cluster of houses Nile would be leaving right then. "Family? Charming. Daughter? Not so charming, once you get to date her for a couple months." 

"Ah. Your ex?" 

"Anex," I corrected, making sure he knew I had more than once and wasn't a dateless loser. 

Marco laughed again. (I really hated that noise.) "One of how many, exactly?" 

"Piss off," I growled. "More than you, I'm sure." 

"Well, I never said I had a lot. You're right. Dating was heavily, heavily frowned upon in the palace. In fact, relations with co-workers was practically prohibited."  

I quirked an eyebrow at him. "You never got laid?" His lips quirked downwards in confusion, so I rolled my eyes and tried again. "You've never had sex?" 

His eyes flashed with comprehension, and he was instantly goofily grinning, smiling at the ground bashfully and sheepishly rubbing his arm. "U-um. Well. The...the no-dating rule was- it was- it was kind of more a suggestion, t-to a lot of people, and there were two times where...uh, yeah, one was with a girlfriend, and one was with a boyfriend." His face was pink. "I didn't really know what I was doing either time, but it was nice." 

I stared at him for a while, trying to wrap my head around what he just said. I couldn't even remember the last time I got laid, and he did it with both a girl and a guy? Inside a fucking palace? Fuck him. "You've done a guy?"  

"Ye...yeah." 

"...What's that like?" I asked it out of genuine curiosity, because I couldn't imagine sex with two dicks. How would it feel when what went where?  

But I never got a verbal answer because I turned my head and a couple meters in front of us, when we were standing at the gate to the mini-village, a man with dark hair in an undercut, a scraggly goatee, and a hair-thin mustache resting on his upper lip stepped out of the door of the house closest to the entrance, clicked it shut, then turned to walk home, tool box clutched tightly in his left hand. 

He halted in his steps, squinting at me and blinking. "Oi, Kirschtein, is that you?" 

I clenched my teeth. 

"What're you doing here? I thought you took the weekend off? If you wanna take that back, we have plenty of jobs for you to use your goddamn powers on." 

"My goddamn powers," I spat, walking closer to him, hearing Marco follow. "My goddamn powers. Having lightning powers- ever wonder what it's like, Nile?" 

His eyes got a little bigger, I noticed, because I never called him Nile. "What?" 

"Maybe you wouldn't have to. Maybe you  _remember._ " And I leapt at him. 

There was a very loud metal clanging as his toolbox was knocked out of his hand and vomited it's contents onto the packed earth below us and I fisted my hand in his hair and drove it's back into the ground as hard as I could. He gurgled of pain and shock and my fist knocked into his nose. "Fuck you!" I screamed. "Go to Hell, you filthy bastard!" 

"What the he-?" I did it again, and blood trickled out of his nostrils. 

Consumed with blind rage, I tightened my fists and raised them above my head, sparks flicking in between my fingers as I hailed lightning to start to sizzle in my palm. I quickly shot them down to the middle of his chest. Electrocution of the heart. A killing blow. 

But all of a sudden, I was being ripped off of Nile by a pair of strong hands clamping onto my shoulders, and thrown forcefully onto the ground. "Jean, stop!" came a shrill shriek, and I panted. 

I was...I was about to kill someone. And I would've, if Marco hadn't stopped me. 

I laid back-first on the ground, staring up hazily at the sky as I heard Nile presumably snort out blood and wail of pain somewhere at my feet. "What the hell's gotten into you, Kir-? ...Marco?" 

I groaned and sat up to see Nile in a similar stance, looking up at Marco. Nile's gaze was flicking between us and he looked totally bewildered. "Why are you here?" 

Marco shuffled around and spoke softly, avoiding eye contact. "Hi, Sir. It's good to see you again." He avoided the question like a goddamn bullet.  

"Wh- Why are you with him?" He snapped his head towards me, nostrils leaking blood flaring. "Why did you attack me?" he barked. 

"He knows," Marco replied under his breath, and Nile's eyes widened.  

"You son of a bitch," I hissed, rising to my feet and clenching my fists. "You ex-Sina son of a bitch." Nile's mouth fell agape and I could see him tensing. I stood up, grinding my teeth as I glared at him. "You," I growled. "You used to be a guard-" 

"Captain of the guards," Marco added quietly. 

"-and you did some treasonous shit that got you kicked out, am I correct?" My intense gaze on Nile  _dared_ him to argue, and he didn't. "But before you did, before you got stripped of your genetic mods you caught a man who was with a short, black-haired man and a tall, blonde man after Pandora's Box and you were in charge of killing him." 

Nile was silent before speaking slowly. "It was my job." 

"He was my father." 

I almost could've torn him to shreds, right there, and I was heavily considering it. He gasped in a little and scooted himself away from me like a filthy coward, and I bared my teeth and took an intimidating step forward in his wake. 

"Don't kill him," I heard Marco say next to me. "Jean, he was just doing his jo-" 

"Shut up, Marco," I spat angrily. "You don't get a say in this." 

"I won't let you kill him," he re-stated more firmly, and I gnawed my lip in irritation. "He might know stuff that's valuable to you, right?" 

I didn't understand him. Actively protesting my goal of getting the Box, then pushing every opportunity possible that might help me get it to me. I sighed, shaking my head. "Fine," I said. I walked over to Nile and planted my foot on his chest, pinning him to the ground. "Alright. Let's talk." 

"...I was just carrying out orders," he muttered. "I had no idea the guy was your father. But he was an intruder. I did what I had to." 

"I could kill you for that," I said quietly in reply. "I could kill you for that, for saying that but I won't. Listen. I want you to tell me what happened and I want you to tell me about Pandora's Box." 

"Or what?" he spat. 

I raised an eyebrow. "Are you really asking that?" 

We held eye contact, burning and filled with rage, for a few seconds before it split off and he sucked in a breath. "What harm can it do me now, I'm already at my lowest point here," he sighed. He looked up. "I wasn't allowed to touch the Box. None of us were, only the King, but...but I wanted to know what it was, what it did. I went into the vault one night and I got caught. Got kicked out, got my powers stripped of me and I was forced to find someway to survive in this grimy hellhole of an area." He grimaced. "The rest is history, I don’t know what the hell you want with me." 

"What is the Box?" I questioned sharply. "What does it do?" 

He laughed dryily. "You'll have me killed before I say that. And I mean it." 

I pressed my foot down harder, and he let out a pained, breathless noise. "Then tell me the code to the safe and I'll let you go." 

He curled his lip back in a snarl. "I'd like to see you try to get it." 

"I've tried, asshole. Twice." 

His gaze seared into mine. "1-0-4-5-7," he said. "On the right keypad. Touch the left keypad and an alarm goes off. But you won't even get to the vault." 

"If you're lying I will come back here and find you and kill you."  

"You wouldn't." 

"Try me." I lifted my foot, and I heard him wheeze in a breath. Marco had been quietly watched our exchange, and he was nibbling at his lower lip. I gave one last disgusted look at my bloody-nosed boss laying on the ground, then turned and shoved my hands in my pockets. "Did you hear that?" 

"Yeah." 

"Alright. Come on, Marco." 

"Kirschtein." I heard my name being called out behind me in a raspy voice, and I turned around to glare at Nile, who was glaring right back. "You're fired." 

I snorted and shook my head, flipping him the bird as I turned my back and walked away with Marco at my side. "Suck my balls, boss," I called back, and we kept walking until he was out of sight and out of mind.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> nEWWWW CHAPTER AYYYYYYYYYYYYY  
> sorry this took so long and sorry the ending was kind of rushed but i hope you enjoy it anyway! oh my god this story is so fun to write wtf.  
> anyway same as always- feedback means EVERYTHING to me (COMMENTS AND KUDOS AND BOOKMARKS OH MY) so thank you all very much for your support!  
> the code, btw, is derived from the 104th squad the the fact that they went on the 57th expedition outside the walls.  
> enjoy!  
> (also if youd like to make a post about it, please use the tag **#fic: pb**! thatd be super awesome. ok ty ily all)


	5. It's Worse When It's Intentional

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I'm many things. But I can't afford for 'desperate' and 'a killer' to be two of them.

The gnarled roots under me rolled up against my already sore back, and reached to press themselves into my spine no matter which way I turned. Sleep out in the grove Marco and I cleared out in the forest just on the outskirts of town was impossible and I had no idea how he managed it. Using a thin sheet we swindled off the clothes line of the Wagners (you'd think they'd stop putting out clothes to dry by now), we draped it over ourselves as a makeshift blanket and tucked our coats under us like shitty cots. The wind whistled in boredom and decided to keep me up for entertainment, slapping me across the face and demanding I wake up everytime I tried to close my eyes. Marco and I slept facing away from each other, curled up with as much space between us as possible- but even so, our backs were pretty much touching anyway, and he provided more warmth than the blanket. He was out like a light, but I couldn't sleep a wink. So I gave up on trying. 

The brim of my hat was clenched tightly in my teeth to make sure I kept quiet as I dragged my palm over the junction between my legs, rolling my hips forward and applying pressure. It felt fucking good and I did it again. I grunted softly, before shifting around and hooking both my thumbs on my waistband and wiggling my trousers down my thighs to bunch at my knees. I did the same to my underwear, wrapping a hand around myself and letting out a soft, satisfied sigh. Grinding my teeth into the brim, I started pumping up and down, hips bucking and mind wandering. I closed my eyes as my breaths stuttered to shallow, shaking puffs as I grinded into my hand, trying to whip up some fantasy to entertain me while I did so.  

My default was Mikasa, and I didn't really feel the need to deviate from that. So I let myself relax and choke back moans that'd wake up Marco as I pictured pale and slim fingers sliding on my dick, her flowery aroma clouding my senses as she'd tease me and thumb the head- just like that, fuck, just like that- then slick her thumb over the slit, _oh_ , god. I panted around the fabric stuffed into my mouth as I twisted to try to get a better angle, letting out a breathy noise as I carefully traced the vein on the underside, and my whole body quivered. My free fist curled into the blanket and my body tensed up and- 

"Hey, Jean?" Funny how two soft, whispered words from somewhere behind your back can ruin your whole night.  

Gnashing my teeth in annoyance, I tugged the hat out of my mouth and drew my fist up to fold my arms over my chest, glaring forward and not looking at him. "What, Marco." 

"...I was just thinking," he began. "We should really give this stuff back. It's not fair of us to keep taking their belongings."  

"Great. Fine, okay. We'll put them back tomorrow, go back to sleep." 

He let out a deep sigh. "I know you don't like me but you don't have to be so snappy every time I try to talk to you." No, but interrupting what could've been a great jacking off session does the trick. "For better or worse we're stuck with each other now, so I think it's better for both of us to learn how to get along." 

I groaned. "No, actually, with you saying you won't help me like you promised doing the one fucking thing I need to, there is literally no reason for me to keep you around other than the fact that you won't go away." There was a beat. "Go to sleep." 

A bubble of silence cushioned the otherwise harsh space falling in-between my words and his. "I'm scared to go to sleep." 

I scrunched up my face and shifted a little. "There isn't anything to be afraid of in these woods." 

Marco seemed to quietly mull over my words before replying in a small, tense tone. "I'm scared of you." 

I instantly gave a groan to vocalize my exasperation, squeezing shut my eyes and laid my forearm over them. "We've been over this. I'm not gonna-" 

"You say that," Marco butted in, tone quick and fluttery. "You say that, and then you let your anger consume you and you find Nile Dawk and pin him helplessly and you try to kill him." A beat of quiet trailed torturously on the end of his words. "You would've murdered somebody in cold blood if I hadn't been there, and I am scared of you." 

Marco had sunk claws into what covering I had tried to place over it and tore open the delicate layer to make me break into a cold sweat.  

 _I almost killed someone. I tried to kill someone. I wanted to kill someone._ I felt sick.  

I didn't have the courage to turn over to face Marco, so I kept curled up with my back to him as I quivered and I hard him draw in a shaking breath. "You let your emotions control you. You let them get so intense that they completely blind you and it's an unstable state of mind, and it's an unhealthy state of mind." A piercing pause tore down my wall completely and drilled into my skull. ( _IwasalmostamurdererIwasalmostnobetterthanhim_ _._ ) When he spoke again, his voice was soft and shaking. "If you get worked up at me really badly, no one will stop you, and you will kill me." 

I whimpered and slammed my hands over my ears, like it would help any.  

"I'm not," I said quickly, stumbling on the words too fast, tripping over them as they left my dry and burning mouth. "I'm not going to- I won't- I'm not a killer." 

"You could be." 

The words brand my skin with the same lightning I could  _kill with_ but I'm  _not a killer_ I can't kill  _I want to kill, I would've killed Nile, I would've killed Marco._  

"Shut up." The words came out as begs, but to Marco or myself I had know way of knowing. "Go to sleep, Marco." He didn't reply.  

I don't know if he ever fell asleep that night, because never once did I turn to look at him. 

* * *

At this point in the continuing story of "get the Box but fuck Marco Bodt", it had been a week after the night I couldn't sleep, and we needed food if we were above resorting to cannibalism. 

Back in my leather jacket and red tee, I clutched my stomach uproarious in angry growls and groaned, slipping through the front gate of Trost with a little knapsack thrown over my shoulder. Marco walked right beside me. We were running low on supplies, so in order to keep up our hopefully temporary hermit-y lifestyle, we'd need to duck into town to get food and water, which, given it'd been nearly three weeks since the palace showdown and we hadn't been caught, I was fairly comfortable doing. Unfortunately, we were low on money, which was more or less a problem. I hadn't thus far mentioned it to Marco. 

"So," he piped up. "Where are we going to buy the stuff?" I glanced over at him. 

His black eye and a lot of his bruises were healing, if not healed, but he wasn't in a shortage of fresh bruises and scrapes from more fights we had engaged in over the week. But I couldn't say I was any less battered up than him because I seemed to kept forgetting that underneath his polite, nervous, nearly timid exterior he could kick my fucking ass. Our fights were beginning to get less frequent, sure, and the uneasy peace after a fight would come faster, but they were still prominent enough to make me sore most mornings. 

I blinked at him and looked forward again. "Cheapest place I can think is a little shop downtown." I paused and sighed. "We probably can't get a lot because I have no money." 

I cringed my wall through the entire silence that followed through. 

"...No...money?" echoed Marco quietly. I didn't look at him so I assume he was staring at me weirdly but I had no way of knowing for sure. "What do you mean? You said we were going to buy supplies!" 

I gnawed my lower lip, stopping in my tracks and hearing him stop beside me as I folded my arms and looked to the side. "Technically I said we were going to  _get_ supplies, I never said...I never said  _buy._ " 

 _"Jean_ ," groaned Marco, long and exasperated. "We are not going to steal anything! I refuse to! We either legally buy it or starve!" 

I whipped around at him, clenching a fist. "You need to get your damn priorities straight!" 

"Get your moralities in line!" he huffed back, flaring up. 

"All is fair in survival, Marco!" 

"You're a bad person!" 

"I hate you  _so_ much."  

His eyes narrowed. "You're not exactly my favorite person on Earth either, you know."  

We held tense eye contact for a moment, as if willing the other to just drop fucking dead under it, then simultaneously grunted and looked away as if it wasn't worth the effort.  

We started walking forward again, even though if we weren't in agreement of what to do, we had no idea where. I looked up, tilting my chin to the sky. Overcast, as always. "Fine, I won't steal. But you can't even pretend to deny that if we don't get shit, we're gonna starve. So either we do it my way or you better be cooking up some bright ideas, rich kid." 

Marco sighed, stuck his gloved hands in his pockets, and looked around. He was quiet for a little and we began to drift into the more densely populated section of town so we silently ducked and dodged the people in our way. A couple vaguely familiar people greeted me, and it pissed me off that there were a couple of attractive girls around my age tripping over themselves to greet Marco, which he responded to politely and with kindness. They never did that for me. Maybe if I got myself a dumb cream jacket, a scarf, and a barf-worthy personality, I'd be popular with ladies, too. 

We walked and we wandered and I was wondering if I was ever going to get an answer until all of a sudden Marco's hand was shooting out to fist into my sleeve. "I got it!" 

I was mid-step and made a disgruntled noises as his hand yanking on my jacket lurched me back. "Ah! Jesus. Okay, fine, what?" I rubbed the back of my head and looked up at him.  

He was actually grinning, eyes lit up in a mixture of eagerness, excitement and probably self-pride. I could already tell he was patting himself on the back for this idea. "You mentioned once that in addition to your job, you did street shows, right?" 

...Ahhh damn, alright, that was brilliant of him. I sucked in a breath through my teeth and nodded. "That'd work. Yeah, I could do that. I could..." An idea popped into my head, and while I wasn't sure I was overly fond of the concept itself, I realized that it could double the success. I blinked then stared at him. "Marco." 

"What?" 

"I have powers. ...You have powers." 

His jaw dropped. "Oh my god. Are you serious?" 

I crossed my arms tightly over my chest, biting the inside of my cheek and letting my eyes wander to the side in feigned apathy. "More serious than I wish I was." A sigh depressed my lungs. "Look, Marco. They pay enough to see  _one_ lightning show- imagine how much we could rake in with two of us! Okay? It's strategical." 

Marco pursed his lips and shuffled uncomfortable. "I've never done anything like that before." 

I waved my hand dismissively. "You're plenty athletic enough. I have a routine...I can sort of- sort of brief you on it and we can practice and then we can...?" I trailed off.  

He hesitated and I felt anxious and oddly embarrassed. He pinched his chin in his thumb and forefinger and slowly nodded, a smile gradually growing on his face. "Hey...that might work. We could pull this off." He turned to me, lowering his hand and pumping it encouragingly. "Teach me what you know, I'll do my very best!" 

I let out a breathy, half-choking half-laughing noise of relief and planted the backs of my hands on my hips. "Alright. Follow me, and...try not to fall on your face."  

* * *

I didn't know how actually confident I was about this, now that I think about it, but it was too late for that so I just tensed up and forced smiles and I stood back-to-back with my bitter rival and waved in an incoming crowd. 

Most people were used enough to my shows to instantly know what was about to happen without me having to say anything. If I was standing in the middle of a pedestrian street, waving my arms, and inviting people to watch, then it meant magic was about to happen, and very soon. But still- considering how much I needed this money, I really upped the advertisement for this one.  

"Hello, hello, everybody!" I called. "Please circle up and prepare for the show- a once-in-a-lifetime show today, because there will be double the action!" Marco behind me was yelling out similar things, waving people over and probably smiling sunshine beams at them. But whatever cheesy tricks he was using worked, because we were drawing in a good amount of spectators- hell, it was a great amount, bigger than normal. Me and Marco hadn't had a lot of time to practice at all if we wanted to do the show in the peak of the day for people being out and about, and practice was kind of awkward and clunky and I had no way of gauging how well Marco would retain everything about the routine I had taken two years to perfect that I relayed to him in a couple of minutes. Not to mention I had to messily adapt it into a two-player version that I had never given any thought to before, so I wasn't sure how this would even go. But even if Marco crashed and burned, I would still keep going, I supposed. Either way, the show would go on.  

Once we had a thick ring of people, all enthusiastic and grinning in wild excitement, gathered around us, I took out the little bag I had thrown over my shoulder earlier from my pocket and held it up above my head and the crowd went quiet as they stared at it. I slowly turned and showed it off, bringing attention to it, before bending and setting it down more towards the outskirts of the circle so that Marco and I wouldn't trip over it while we performed. "Donations afterwards are much needed and very much appreciated, folks," I called as I jogged back to the center and went back-to-back with Marco again. I drew in a mouthful of air and tilted my head to murmur to Marco. "Ready?" 

"Ready," came the equally quiet reply.  

I turned my attention back to the spectators, beaming. "Ready?" I called out. A chorus of cheers replied. Alright. Good audience. Better give 'em the ol' razzle dazzle. 

I jabbed Marco with my elbow and murmured, "Now." 

"Now?" 

"Now!" 

And together, we snapped our right arms up straight, fingers outstretched to the heavens. And from our hands came twin bolts of lightning, twisting and twining around one another, my hair blowing back from face as the jagged crack of electricity made a pathway to the sky. My signature starting move- and this show was off.  

The crowd went ballistic from sheer thrill and anticipation, and probably fueled also by the fact that now there was  _two_ lightning-manipulators performing. While their heads were up to the sky and watching it light up the thick quilt of ash gray overcast the lightning had been sucked into, I sharply pushed my elbow into Marco's back again, signaling him to stop and get on to the next move. Letting out a little hiccup of pain, he complied, and we flicked our wrists to cease the lightning. "Forward roll," I hissed out curtly. 

"I know, I know!" came his rushed reply, and trusting that he was doing the same, I put my hands out in front of me and threw my weight after them, my feet leaving the ground as I bounded forward in a spring, feet trailing lightning in my arc of motion. I landed on my hands, then kicked over my head to bring the rest of my body afterwards, flipping back to stand upright on my feet. To regain my balance, I spread my arms out on either side of me while I wobbled momentarily, then grinned at the cheering the crowd screamed at us. I looked over my shoulder to see Marco in an identical position, which made me smile wider. Good, he did the same thing. And we probably did it at the same time, which probably made it way, way cooler.  

I spun on my heel and Marco did too, so we were facing each other from the edges of the circle clearing we were in, and we beamed at each other. I signaled the next move to him, and he nodded- and we both turned sideways, raising our arms above our heads. We rocked onto one foot, then threw ourselves down as we landed on our hands and cycled over in cartwheels. We circled through three cartwheels to the center of the circle, letting lightning blaze trails from both our hands and feet as we did. I couldn't hold back the whop of laughter bubbling in my stomach as I did because the crowd was super responsive and above all, this was fun. This was what I was best at- a showman at heart. When we finally reached each other, we smiled and held up our right fists, tapping our left fists to our right elbows. We connected the wrists of our right hands, and concentrating on each other, began to slowly walk in a circle around one another, like the revolving doors in city hall. Slowly, slowly, we circled, gradually getting faster and faster and beginning to let lightning off of our fists and the faster we walked, the more the lightning curved with us, creating a spinning cyclone of the electricity bolts around us. Our neat formation only stayed that way for so long, though- we clamped our right hands together in an iron hold and leaned back, still circling each other and letting centrifugal force propel us even faster as we outstretched our left hands and let sparks fly from our fingertips. We were whipping each other around impossibly fast, our lightning connecting and making rounds around us, and we held on tight and grinned at each other as the wind we stirred whipped at us but god, I was happier than I had been in weeks. And in Marco's eyes, there was no longer a lingering sorrow or anger like there always had been every time I looked at him. It was joy, as pure as I had ever seen. And I loved it. I loved it and I never wanted to see anything other than this in his eyes ever again. 

At my call, we broke off, but the force was still propelling us backwards. We used this to our advantage, arms extended and feet kicking as we let it carry us through backwards handsprings. We landed at the same time, facing each other and visibly panting but smiling. Sweat beaded down my cheeks and neck and I didn't care at all. We were so in-sync with each other, it's like we were connected. I didn't need hand signals or calls anymore. We would jump at the same time, spring forward, cartwheel and kick together so perfectly you'd swear we'd been practicing this for years. Our steps matched and when we were close enough, I could hear our breathing in-time with each other's. The heat radiated our skin and I felt so happy, I felt  _so happy_ with his dark brown eyes sparkling as they looked fondly on mine and our lightning weaving in each other's and the crowd screaming cheers all around us.  

We had sprung enough leaps and spun ourselves into fatigue, and we had given the crowd a show we knew they would never forget, and it was time to bring a close to the performance Trost would keep with them forever.  

Without words, we flipped around to press our backs together again as we put my finale move into action. I pointed at one spot on the ground, then flicked my wrist down to send a bolt of lightning crashing into the earth, then gritted my teeth and snapped my arm up, the lightning following the movement and shooting up at the sky from the ground, like a column of lightning. I did the same at a spot opposite from it, and I looked over my shoulder to Marco mirroring my movements behind me. We had created a square of lightning columns streaking up to the sky with us in the middle, the same fantastical display I began this story with, back when I was a solo artist and before my life as I knew it got flipped on it's head. And just as I did back then, I grinned and shouted, "Now!" and Marco and I leapt into the air, flipped mid-jump, and slammed our fists into the ground when we landed, and the lightning sizzled, crackled, and then ceased entirely. 

The show was over.  

My legs shook as I held that final ending pose, quivering under me as my fist pressed into the dirt and I panted open-mouth like a dog in the sun. Sweat plastered my shirt beneath my hot jacket to an uncomfortable, wet, skin-tight fit and my hair was wild from whipping around and clumping with dampness. I felt exhausted, but the crowd rabidly screaming around us brought a shaky smile to my face. My shoulders bounced with the heaving gasps I was sucking in, and I tilted my head to my left to see how Marco was doing. And there he was, right in front of me, smiling and eyes glowing, hand outstretched to me. "We did it," he whispered. "We were amazing." 

I breathed heavily as I glanced from him, to his hand, to him, to his hand. Then I shook my head and grinned, grabbing his hand and hoisting myself up. "You're goddamn right we were."  

Our hands clasped as we faced the crowd and waved, which made them go even crazier. I gave breathless chuckles, we both did. "Donations please," I called weakly with what energy remained, and gestured to the empty knapsack set up. That was brilliant of me to do, because all of a sudden, people were tripping over themselves to get to it and toss shining coins into the gaping mouth of the bag.  We slowly walked over to stand beside it, thanking people for coming, thanking them for their donations. We got thanked in turn for our performance, a praiseful comment packaged with every coin flipped into the bag. I gave a couple sweaty handshakes to those who requested, and struck up brief conversation with some people who stopped to gush. I winked at a couple of the cute girls, who smiled and giggled and dropped some money to us, and hell, it could've been the best day of my life.  

The crowd lingered and clung before eventually sifting out and returning to whatever it was they were doing or going. Once everyone had cleared out, I bent down to pick up the sack, and beamed with delight at how hard it was to lift. "Yes! Yes! There's so much in here, this is great! Help me pick it up!" 

Marco let out a happy gasp, bending down, and together, we heaved the bag up with shaky arms. Cradling it close to me, I smiled at it's glittering contents. "Oh, fuck, we struck the  _jackpot._ " 

"That's so great!" Marco said, between pants but enthusiastic. "From the way you talked about here I didn't think we would be able to get half as much as this!" 

I smiled and shook my head. "No, no, this area is extremely poor. But...we care about each other and we look out for each other with what little spending money we have. And most people can only afford to give one coin to something like this- but if everyone here pitched in a coin, even if it  _was_ just one..." I chuckled and shook the bag, leaving the rattling and clinking to finish my sentence for me. "A coin a person is still amazing if there's a crowd." 

With laughter in my eyes, I looked up at Marco, and we just smiled. 

I didn't know what changed that day, and I still don't. I hated him, I hated him so much, I wanted him dead and he knew it and he was scared to sleep in fear of me killing him in slumber. We had ruined each other's lives and there should've been absolutely no reason for any of that to change. 

But...instead of bashing heads like we always did, like we insisted on doing, for the first time we worked together, and the result was incredible for everyone involved. He wasn't being rude to me or snappy to me, he was talking fondly and it shocked me but I liked it. I liked this side of him, genuinely liked it. I didn't know how I overall felt, because more than anything I was confused. But right then and there, it was a connection, and I think we both felt it. 

We chatted pleasantly all the way to the supplies vendor, swinging the knapsack between us. He told me of his family life, of his siblings- three little brothers, one little sister, and one of the brothers and the sister were twins. The twins and youngest brother were fireballs of energy, but the second oldest was more calm and poised to be a guard like him. He told me he missed them and barely ever got to see them for the four years he had been a guard, and wondered if he'd ever see them again. He told me I'd like them if I ever met them. 

I told him I lived near my mother, who was a lovely woman once you got past the overbearingness. I told him he was welcome to meet her whenever he wanted. 

* * *

The fire crackled and popped, the heat warmly spreading over my chest, the leaves of the forest rustled and half-cooked pork on the bone had never tasted so good. 

I gnawed feverishly on the meat in my hands, trying to sedate my empty and churning stomach that had been growling in protest. I messily ripped off chunks of it with my teeth my jerking my head back, chewed it less than I should have in my impatience, and swallowed. I had been totally famished, and this was a godsend. 

"You're going to get a stomachache," came Marco's muffled mumble, chewing slowly on his own meat from the side of the fire he sat on. 

"Don't care," I replied hastily, wolfing down my mouthful.  

There was a couple moments of silence before he spoke up again. "You didn't cook your meat all the way through. That could-" 

"Don't care, really." I cut him off and tore off another strip of meat. It had been at least a week since I last had proper food to eat and I damn well deserved it. After the performance we went over to the butcher's shop, run by a friend of mine named Sasha and her father. They were one of the few non-Sina-endorsed companies that operated here. They went out and hunted all the animals themselves- Sasha once let me come with her on a hunting expedition to watch and it was pretty fucking awesome. Girl gets nuts with a bow and arrow.  

We have them a hefty load of coins in exchange for a hefty load of meat, and neither Sasha or I could've been happier.  

So Marco and I were sitting down and having a delicious meal that was far overdue. I chomped on the pig until my stomach stopped hurting, probably looking gross and unappetizing as I did but I couldn't care less. I was letting out pleased little moans while Marco was a lot quieter and not as ravenous as me. "So," he piped up at one point. "What now?" 

I shrugged and pulled back to breathe, wiping my mouth on my arm. "What do you mean, what now?" 

He stared down at his food, and I half-hoped he was about to tell me he wasn't overly hungry and was about to offer it to me. "What do we do next?" 

My mouth stretched open wide over the bite it hovered above, but I sighed deeply and lowered it. "...Marco, you know what my answer to this is." 

He picked at the meat. "You don't have to," he said softly, not meeting my eyes. "You don't have to get the Box." I looked up at him and our gazes locked before he put his meat down in his lap, wrapped his arms around himself, looked to the side and sighed. "You're so insistent on getting it but have you considered what might happened? You're not even supposed to be alive right now, and had it been anyone other than me you would be dead." He turned his head back towards mine, expression nearly pleading. "Why do you insist on throwing yourself into danger, Jean? What will it accomplish?" 

At that I scowled down at my food with frustration. Frustration that he was bringing it up and even more frustration because I actually understood what he meant and it made sense.  

"I promised I would," I said quietly, which upset me because against the point he made, it was incredibly weak justification. "I said I would and..." 

"But how much harm would it do not getting it?" he replied. "You may have said you would but if you just say that you aren't ready to throw your life away over something-" 

"Sentiment," I growled, tearing off another bite and swallowing. "I told you before. Part of it was a letter from my dead dad. He was really trying to change humanity for the better, and I'm expected to do the same. I...I don't want to disappoint him." 

There was a heavy pause, and I noticed the hand holding the bone shaking. 

"You can't spend your life living for the dead." It came as a whisper, or almost one. Low, deep and soft as he stared into the fire. "You need to keep the departed with you but trust that they'll be proud of you just for being you." 

"How do you know that?" I challenged. 

"Because that's what I'd do." Silence, piercing and uncomfortable, fell upon us again. "Because...if I was dead and looking over my loved ones I'd want them to remember me but I wouldn't want them to- to-." He cut off, then tossed his picked-clean bone aside and drew his knees to his chest. "It's hard to explain, but I'm sure your father is plenty proud of you without you risking your life in some delusionally dangerous gamble in his name." 

Suddenly, the food got a lot heavier in my stomach. I swallowed shakily and looked down at the bone, sighing and tossing it into the fire.  

"Says the guard who never lost anyone." And quiet dragged on again. 

Marco was still hugging his knees to his chest and staring nearly unblinking into the fire when I looked up. "Marco." 

"Huh?" 

I sunk my teeth into my lower lip, drawing in a breath before I spoke again. "Wh...why are you still here?" He looked up at me with wide eyes. "No, I'm not telling you to go away, but...what reason do you have for staying? I mean- you disagree with everything I do and we-" I was about to say we don't even like each other, but I stopped myself because weirdly enough, I felt like that'd cancel out the performance we had earlier together and I didn't really want that. "-...I just don't get it." 

"...Oh." He went back to staring at the fire. "Like I said the first day, I don't know how to survive on my own." 

I shook my head. "I'm calling bullshit. You question everything I do, which means you already have an idea of how this is supposed to go and argue when I don't follow it. And also, you made the fire. I think you could've survived on your own just fine. So pick another answer." 

He blinked, brows furrowing and pursing his lips, before shifting to place his mouth to his knees, leaving just his nose, eyes and forehead poking out above them. "The first day I really thought I couldn't. And then it was more I realized I didn't have anywhere to go, even if I did leave. I don't know any other areas. But really, I think it comes down to this: I may not be offering the palace breaking-and-entering services I said I would once I found out your objective, no. But you still need me."  

My mind wheeled in rapid attempts to make sense of his words, because if I just said, "You're right!" or, "You're wrong," then it would sound a lot smarter than "The hell are you going on about now?". I hated asking clarification for everything from him, but he made it hard not to with his weird vaguely-uplifting but non-specific way of making points. I sighed and caved. "What do you mean?" 

He shifted a little, shoulders bouncing in a little shrug but it was clear he knew the answer anyway. "Because without me, you would've killed him." 

"Without you, I wouldn't have known in the first place," I snarled back. 

"Would that have satisfied you?" I opened my mouth, then closed it in a silent answer. "You need me to keep you in check. You can pretend to deny that as much as you want but I think we both know that's true." 

We had somehow gotten a lot closer together than we were, and we were on the same side of the fire now, close enough for our noses to almost touch as we stared each other down. 

"Maybe," I murmured. "Maybe you're right. Fine, you are right. But just because you're a self-appointed babysitter you can't tell me not to do the one thing I intended on, because I didn't as you to come along." 

Okay, now our foreheads _were_ touching, and a shiver ran down my back. "You never told me to leave," he counteracted. 

I pressed a little harder against him. "Stay out of my way." 

He slipped his eyes shut, letting a warm breath out from his mouth to fan across my lips. "Why do you always look like you're going to kiss me or kill me, Jean?" he asked softly. 

I closed my eyes, too. "Killing you doesn't work," I replied quietly, and I was suddenly acutely aware of the heat of his skin, the brush of his hand on the back of mine, of my own heart hammering in my chest. 

"You haven't tried kissing me." 

And so I did. 

We tilted our heads and slowly leaned in, our lips softly brushing in a chaste, light kiss, and I was disgusted and intrigued. I could've vomited as Marco's gloved fingers slipped into my hair, gently, gently, bringing me forward more and holding my mouth firmly to his, but god, I could've melted as he tipped his head to adjust the angle and run his tongue in a hot stripe on my lower lip. Instinct carried me through lacing my fingers around the small of his back and I hated and loved the fingers of his other hand at the bottom of my ear and sliding down the slant of my jawline.  

I couldn't stand myself as he kissed my lips open mouthed, slotting his mouth to my own and our tongues brushed. It was pathetic, the way I pulled him hard against me and licked my way into his mouth, trying to memorize the shape of his tongue with my own and let my own stuttered moans roll down his throat. He swindled the breath from my lungs and gulped it down and I loathed this foul desperation burning in the pit of my stomach which I tried to pretend Marco was just a release for and nothing more. I hated this guard who lived a life of ignorant luxury while the rest of us starved, who watched my father be killed and never spoke a word against it, who promised me help and denied me of it and shamed me for my objective. I hated him all of a sudden, and I sunk my teeth into his lower lip and fisted my hand in his hair, threatening to yank.  

Even with the startled cry that cracked from his throat, he was impossibly quick on the uptake, and he pulled his head back until my teeth were off his mouth and dove in, kissing me more roughly and raking his nails down my sides because he was mad, too, he hated me, too. I pulled on his hair and he let out a whimper of pain and sunk his nails into my hips, which made me hiss and squirm. When our mouths collided again he nipped at my lip, and did it with force. In retaliation, I yanked down on his scarf and a pained mewl was coaxed from him as it momentarily  tightened around his throat. His fingers found the soft, wispy peachfuzz hairs on the sensitive back of my neck, and I tensed in anticipation of a yank there, but he only gently stroked and little electric-like shudders ran through my body. My back arched and his tongue flicked across a sweet spot at the back of my palette, and my hand settled on his thigh. Our heads bobbed back in forth in the same synchronization as earlier and fire licked the inside of my veins. It was the most shameful thing I had ever done but it was exhilarating, with a hidden edge of danger to it that lit my nerves up in flames. We trembled up against each other’s bodies, our chest pressed together in a way where our erratic heartbeats were aligned and our pulses chased each other as the drummed and collided. It was a game between us. An aggressive game of will to make the other drop first. And I lost. 

Marco's fingers, having crept underneath my jacket and were skating over the fabric of my close-fitting shirt, brushed over a spot right in between my shoulder blades that made me pull back and tip my head back as a shiver pulsed through my and a hitched noise of pleasure tore from my throat. And then, for the first time since just before we kissed, I opened my eyes.  

Marco's eyes were already wide open, looking at me, almost _horrified._ He quickly drew his hand out and let go of me altogether, shaking his head and hiccupping on little gasps. "Oh my god, I-I'm- I'm so- I-" 

And it hit me, too. My stomach churned from sickening realization that I had just spent who knows how long kissing the person who I hated more than anyone else in the universe, who I thought I hated, who I- I didn't know anymore. I kissed him because I wanted to and I loved it, every second of it when I was fully prepared to take his life two or three weeks together. I didn't know how to feel. Everything was jumbled up in my head and I was panting heavily with big eyes and I was scared.  

I instantly wiped my mouth off on my sleeve, trying to get his taste out of me, trying to scrub the kiss off my lips. It was wrong, wrong, wrong. I didn't even look at him, I just crawled over into the blankets we had bought and set up that were designated as mine as I curled up beneath them, my back to him. 

He didn't say anything else to me. I heard him scuffle dirt around to put out the fire like he did every night. Then I heard the rustling of fabric as he slipped into his own makeshift bed. And then it was quiet, with the exception what birds' lonely calls that were not swallowed by the famished wind.  

I didn't want this. I didn't want the burden of the Box, I didn't want my life to be endangered if I dared to leave the temporarily safe confines of my own town, and I didn't want to need Marco.  

I curled up tightly and willed myself to disappear. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> nice job fucking urself over, jean. AGAIN. wow  
> so as always, firstly, thank you all for reading!! this story hit 4k views today and considering it only had four chapters thats AMAZING OMG!! all the views, kudos, AND COMMENTS ESPECIALLy COUGHS really mean the world to me, thank you all very, very much!  
> ALSO SO THERES MORE FANART HOLY CRAP??? HOLY CRAP> [LOOK AT THE AMAZING SECOND PIC AND I ABSOLUTELY LOVE THE GUARDS OUTFIT DESIGNS THEY DID](http://yunishinoya.co.vu/post/91498675351/greenalms-aayy-flint-happy-happy-birthday) AND [THIS GORGEOUS PIC DOT DID WHICH IS 100% HOW I IMAGINED MARCOS OUTFIT BY THE WAY](http://yunishinoya.co.vu/post/91515128731/hdotk-happy-birthday-flint-you-adorable-ass) AND [THIS CUTEASS JEAN](http://yunishinoya.co.vu/post/89488004561/dustytherper-i-promised-jeankirstchein-that-i)  
> so yeah um i really enjoyed writing this chapter and i hope you all enjoyed it!  
> [my tumblr is here](http://yunishinoya.co.vu/) and again the tag for this fic, if youd like to use it, is **fic: pb**!  
>  thank you!


	6. All I Ever Needed

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I have a lot of things to come to terms with. Most of them are within myself.

I don't recommend waking up sparring with someone, then hating them, then being coerced into cooperation with them and being shocked to find you might like them, then kissing them, getting angry at them halfway through the kiss, and going to sleep questioning how the hell you even feel about them- all about the same person and within and eight hour time period. 

I woke up the next morning to sunlight dappling through the trees and slapping me in the fucking face. I grunted and swatted at the air, like it'd ward off the light, and squeezed my eyes shut and pressed my palms into my eyes. In those first couple of hazy, waking moments, all that was on my mind was how annoying the sun was, how nasty the taste in my mouth was, and how weird my dream was last night. My back wasn't as sore as it usually was because with the money we made, we bought nicer cushioning and- the money we made. We. Me and him. I kissed Marco. 

Chewing on my lip, I looked over to where Marco was curled up across the charred remains of a fire parallel to me. He was tucked in a little ball, his short front bangs sweeping gently into his calm, peaceful face, his chest gently rising and falling in soft, regulated breathing. I kissed those slightly-open lips, and I hated myself.  

I put my head in my hands, breathing out deeply, stomach bubbling with odd feelings that I didn't know how to categorize. Regret? Anger? It had to be one of those. I wouldn't let myself consider it to be anything else. I liked kissing him, I know I did, but I didn't want it to turn into anything.  I didn't want to develop feelings for him, like I knew was possible. But letting myself give in to the shivers running down my body and the pulse spiking in my throat when I thought about it would be going against everything I had done to this point. 

My hatred had become so much of who I was, I didn't know what I'd do without it.  

Marco's face scrunched up and he curled up tighter on himself, mouth nuzzling against his knees, and the movement caught my eye enough to snap me back into focus. He was still asleep, I could tell that, but probably just reacting to a dream he was having. I thought nothing of it, and almost would've gone back to just staring into the woods leaving me to my own thoughts had he not started talking. 

"No," he whispered softly, and I blinked and stared at him as he twitched and whined. Had he always slept-talked? "No!" He wormed around a little, then went still again.  

My gaze on him stayed laser-focused, waiting for him to say something else, but he stayed still for so long I eventually figured he was done. But my head snaps back to him when his vocal cords were up again, and his tightly curled up position has relaxed. He was still on his side facing me again, but his body was no longer bunched up. "Jean..."  

Oh, hell's bells.  

My cheeks flushed red as his pinched face relaxed, head shifting. "Jean, ah...Jean..." Shit, shit, no,  _no,_ he  _moaned my name_ which was bad because we hate each other, we're supposed to hate each other, making out was a fluke, that was it. But Marco's mouth lulled open and his hips twitched and he made those sexual noises again that I hadn't heard since they were from my own mouth however long ago it had been since I last had I girl between my legs and it clicked that his subconscious is whipping up some nasty fantasy about  _me_ to entertain him while he slept.  Jesus shit. I was blinking at him rapidly, instantly going into denial to pretend he wasn't doing this, trying to focus all my attention on the tree in front of me as a bead of sweat dripped down my chin. I tried to block him out, and I almost did. I could've done it had there not been that voice in the back of my head not letting me forget that Marco was asleep and moaning in a wet dream that, unless there'd been more than one guy named Jean who had recently gotten him riled up, was about me.  

He shuddered and bucked and by the end, my hand was between my legs and I was grinding against it because he sounded really nice and I was fucked up. Jacking off to the subconscious moans of the man who was terrified of being killed by me. Arching my back and shivering and gasping from the man whose blood I wanted on my hands.  

It was gross, and it was completely fucked up. 

When Marco had stilled, then inhaled sharply through his nose and his arms came above his head as a sign of waking up, it was a relief. 

His mouth stretched open in a yawn and he groggily sat up while I quickly laid back down and covered myself with blankets again, trying to make it look like I had only just woken up too. Marco scratched at his neck and blinked open his eyes. His first course of action was to sit up and lift up his blanket and peer underneath. He made a face and sighed before letting it fall back to his thighs. He laid back down on his side, now facing me, blinking groggily and noticing that I was awake. "Good morning," he said softly.  

I ran my tongue-tip over my cracked lips. "Hi," I said, quickly and flatly. 

An awkward silence sat between us, and I averted my eyes. And instantly he jumped to the exact thing I didn't want to talk about, but I couldn't expect anything different. "Are we going to talk about last night?"  

I didn't want to. I narrowed my eyes and curled up tighter. "You should be sorry," was the first thing I spat. It was mean of me to say but in the moment I couldn't find it in my angered self to care. 

He held tense eye contact with me before his eyes dropped down. I saw him purse his lips and he hugged his knees to his chest. "I'm sorry," he mumbled gently. "I guess it was my fault. I initiated it. I didn't mean to make you uncomfortable." His words were dripping with guilt and regret. He looked back up at me. "If you want to make nothing of it, I'm completely content with that." 

If I wanted to? Ha! I snorted disdainfully and rolled onto my bag, staring up at the branches weaving a canopy above my head and tightly folding my arms. "Of course not. Last night was a fluke, wasn't it?" He didn't respond. "We don't like each other. We're not supposed to like each other. The show, the kiss, it was- it-" 

"...It was?" he repeated slowly.  

I gave an exasperated huff, flailing my hands around. "I don't know!  It wasn't supposed to happen! I'm here until I can grab the goddamn Box and go home, and if you have some weird little crush on me, then why aren't you  _helping?_ "  

He shot up straight, his dark eyes glinting with anger as he trained them on me, lips pulling downwards in a deep set frown. "I didn't say I had a crush on you, stop putting words in my mouth!" 

I turned my head towards him, upper lip pulled back in a snarl. "Oh yeah? Then what were you dreaming about, huh?" 

Jerked forward to reply, he straightened back up, his eyes widening and mouth closing shut. His cheeks flushed a light rose and his lips pressed together. 

I raised an eyebrow at him. "You talk in your sleep." 

"I...I can't- Jean, that's not fair, I can't control what I dream about." His voice was small and tight and almost afraid, cusping on a whimper or a cry. "No one can." 

The guilt was sinking fangs into my flesh and ripping me up raw. My stomach had dropped low and churned, and a pricking, sharp, uncomfortable heat shot up my spine. I bit down hard on the inside of my cheek and dug my fingernails into the moss beneath me, baring my gritted teeth. "Whatever. I don't care. Listen, I can't afford to pay attention to romance or whatever when I have some bullshit box to get or die trying." 

"And what good is that going to do?" His question pressed against me with gradually increased force and irritation.  

"I don't know, Marco!" I said, huffing with annoyance. "I haven't planned that far ahead! I just know when I get the Box and get it to Levi and Erwin it'll be over!"  

"You don't know that though, do you?" he replied snappily. 

I ground my teeth and pressed a hot hiss out between them. "I don't know! Maybe I'll get the Box and just leave you there to your buddies' mercy, Marco! That'd solve a lot of my problems!"  

It was a horrible thing to say, but in my anger, I couldn't care less. I waited for him to snap back something more insulting, to growl at me and yell at me. But he did something even worse. 

His lip wobbled. He turned his head from mine and stared down in his lap, and he whispered. "You're always so...so mean. To me. All the time." His voice was cracking and every word dragged down with emotion. "No matter what I do. I don't do anything to you. I try to be nice and understanding. I know I come from a privileged background but god, I'm trying my best to not make mention of it! To accept the reality I'm in! I try my hardest to make this partnership work but it's never enough for you!" He whips his head around to glare at me through the wet glisten in his eyes I recognize as the beginning of tears. "Why haven't you just killed me already if your plan in the end is to get rid of me, anyway?" 

"I am not a killer!" I scream back, slamming my sparking fists into the ground in anger. "Stop making an enemy out of me!" 

"You would've killed me then, Jean! You would've killed him then! If you get the Box, I could get killed in front of you and you wouldn't lift a finger!"  

"Shut up! Shut up!" I roared, the sparks from my fists starting to lick up my arms. I almost wanted to spring forward and shove him down and put lightning down his throat, just to make him stop talking. But that could kill him, and killing him was the last and first thing I wanted to do. "You think you know me and you don't!" I jabbed my thumb to my chest as I barked out the words to him. "I wouldn't dare stoop to that leve-!" 

"You  _would,_ though!" he shot back, clenching his own fists. "You wanted to! You're dangerous and unstable and if you're going to do nothing but go after a ridiculous goal and belittle me for my very presence, then I don't want a part in it!"  

"Then leave!" I gesticulated wildly at the woods around us, as if inviting him to disappear into it and away from me. "Go and get yourself killed before I can, if you're so convinced that I will!"  

Would I? I don't know. I was so afraid of myself, so absolutely fucking  _terrified_ of how quickly I resorted to tearing to shreds when I was mad and how my brain shut off rational thinking to nothing but mindless violence that I never gave a second thought about.  

So I wanted him to leave before I tore myself apart.  

We were standing, now, facing each other with our fists clenched by our sides, and both of our eyes were drawn to the ground below us. And when he spoke again, his words were hushed and under his breath, as if he put them at a tone where he couldn't decide if he wanted me to hear or not. "...I'll leave if you really want me to, I will. But I only ask that you think about it and see if it's really what you want." 

 _"You need me to keep you in check. You can pretend to deny that as much as you want but I think we both know that's true."_  

His words from the night previous came to my mind, what he had whispered to my just before our heads tilted and lips brushed and an electric tingle like I had never felt before licked it's way through my veins and raked it's claws down my spine. And he was right.  

He could make me see red from fury in a few words. He could make me scream of anger. He could make me bash my fists into a wall until my knuckles bled, if he really wanted to. 

But he could make me smile. 

I needed him, I knew I needed him. I needed him to keep me from losing myself until I could learn to do it myself. I needed someone to talk to so I wouldn't go insane. I needed someone to do street shows with me in perfect sync. I even needed someone to have weird, hormonal make outs with by the fire.  

We all need someone to drive us mad, don't we? 

I sighed and bent my head forward, rubbing my fists into my eyes as one would do to rub the sleep out of their eyes when they were sleeping. I stayed like that for a few more beats of silence before  lying my hands flat to drag them down my face, exhaling gruffly and making eye contact with Marco and dropping one hand to my side and the other hand to my hip. "Okay, that was all...incredibly dickish of me." 

He nodded. "Yeah." 

"I have...issues?" 

He nodded. "Yeah." 

"A lot, probably, but anger issues are way up there." 

He nodded. "Yeah." 

"And- I'm sorry." I bit back adding an 'I guess' onto the end as to not invalidate my sincerity. "Like...ah, fuck." I ground the heels of my hands into my squeezed-shut eyes again. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry. You're a part of my life now, whether I want to accept it or not." I spread apart my fingers to peak at him through them. He was wiping his eyes on the staff of his hand and then clasped his hands behind his back and nodded. "So...if you want to leave, you can. I'm an angry piece of shit. But if for some reason beyond either of us you want to stay, then I guess I would appreciate that." I looked to the side and scratched the side of my neck with a fingernail. "Gotta have someone to pull my ass out of trouble, if you're still up to it." 

He smiled, I think. And I did too, maybe.  

He opened his mouth to speak, taking a little step forward. Would've loved to have heard what he was going to say, but that was kind of hard when he was suddenly bowled over by a lightning-fast streak of silver shooting out from the trees.  

* * *

Did I understand what was happening? 

No! Of course not! When have I understood anything ever in this story so far? 

"Marc-!" I began to shout out, but just as it was hard to listen to him when he was getting knocked over by a streak of silver, it was hard to talk when I was getting knocked over by a streak of silver.  

My voice cracked off from his name to a sharp grunt of pain as I was slammed into the ground by something heavy and something incredibly fast. A breath was forced from my lungs and left my lips as a raspy wheeze. My bones rattled painfully in my skin and I gasped. Or, would've, if a hand didn't clamp down over my mouth. "Aha!" rang a high-pitched, airy, laughing and so distinct that I recognized it immediately female voice. "I got you myself! Good to see you again, cutie!" 

Now normally, being pinned down by a cute woman who thinks I'm attractive is a good thing. But this time, I'd really rather anything but, considering that this was the woman from the palace who was all-too-gleeful about the prospect of me being dead. 

She smiled at me and spoke with a chipper voice, close enough for her wavy light brown chin-length hair  to tickle my cheekbones. Her hazel eyes grinned playfully at me and she shifted her weight on me to make escape difficult, her palm pressed to my lips. My eyes widened and my first instinct was to thrash, but she just let out a giggle and lifted her hand from my mouth to press down on my forearms. I screamed and bowed up in pain at the agonizingly familiar feeling of lightning burning into my skin and searing my muscles, leaving the limbs in a state of temporary paralysis. While I know the alternate to my situation was death, as it would electrocute a normal person, and the paralysis that being somewhat lightning-resistant brought was a far better option, in this situation, it sure as hell didn't seem like it. 

My eyes were shut with the excruciating pain of another's lightning coursing through my veins, but they snapped open with a sharp gasp to the girl pinching my nose. "Ah-ah-ah, stay still." 

"Bitch!" I cried out. 

Her eyebrows furrowed with anger and she folded her arms. "It's  _Hitch,_ honey," she hissed.  

Marco,  _Marco,_ was all I could think, because it was easy enough to piece together the situation and I was worried as fuck about him. Panicked, I turned my head to the side, seeing Marco a couple yards away from me wrestle with the short blonde woman I had seen among the other guards at the palace. Ah, shit, what was her name?  _Annie._  

"Annie, please!" he cried, pinned down like me, but instead bracing his head and twisting to try to avoid the punches she was throwing down at him. "Annie, it's me!" 

It struck me as odd that she was throwing punches at him and missing instead of simply lightning-paralyzing him, which would've been far easier. But then I looked at her face, pinched in discomfort with her lips pursed. I figured quite quickly that Annie and Marco were friends, and she didn't want to do this, and was therefore still trying to complete the probably assigned task of capturing him without hurting him too badly.  

Hitch, however, had no such pre-established-relationship sympathy for me.  

Her fingers were on my jaw and yanked my head forward to look up at her again. She smiled sweetly, and I wanted to punch that fucking smile off her face,  _if I could fucking move my arms._ "You gave us a lot of trouble. If you would've just died like you were _supposed to_ -" Her fingers tightened on my jaw and I gave a low groan of pain. "-then we wouldn't be here. Took us a long time to find you! Had all our best wall guards sniffing out your trails, but even then, it was hard. The woods really fucks with their abilities to find you, you know!" I gritted my teeth and threw my weight in an attempt to throw her off, but she just shoved down her knee right into the sensitive little area in between my legs and I hacked and jerked up from pain. "I told you not to squirm!  _Geez._ Are you even listening?" Her face pulled up in a pout. 

I breathed heavily as I glared up at her, trying to see how Marco was from my peripheral vision because she still hadn't let me turn my head. I couldn't see much. "Look," I snarled, eyes flicking back up to Hitch. "When I can feel my arms again, this is going to get really nasty really fast, so let me go and we can compromise." 

She snorted disdainfully. "Right! Because I came all the way here to just hop on off and let your criminal ass run free again against my orders!" She clenched her fingers again, and I loathed the discomfort her strong hold right against the bone brought. "Besides, even if you  _do_ run, good luck outrunning the ton of sniffers we've got behind us!" 

They had an  _army?_ My heart skipped a beat in terror, because that completely threw out the plan to just get Hitch and Annie off and then me and Marco could book it. If they brought the damn wall guards with their inhumanly tuned senses who sniffed us out  _with_ them, we were fucked. But Hitch's smile just kept dripping honey like her voice, and god, I could've snapped her spine. "They brought a select few of us interior guards along, too! They only pointed out the general direction you two were in, though. I ran ahead because me and Annie wanted to be the first ones to find you. And I got you before everyone else did, ahaha!" She gave a delighted clap. "So I'm gonna kill you right now and bring your body back and everyone is gonna be  _so_ impressed. I might even get that raise I've been asking for! Aw, wouldn't that be something? Okay, hunk, don't move. Ah, not that you can. Where's my pistol? Oh, there it is, I thought I dropped it. Oh by the way, really quick before I kill you, what's your name? A few of us were cu-"  

The paralysis wore off. 

My fist came sailing up to knock straight into cheekbone, which made her shriek. Her hands came up to rest against where I had struck her, and while I didn't knock her off of me, I shocked her enough and hurt her enough to be able to shake her off if I thrashed my body then clamped my hand around her throat and shoved her down to the ground. "You jackass!" she screeched, clawing at my hand around her neck. I responded by squeezing, and she let out a strained choking gasping noise. Throwing my body on top of her to make sure she wouldn't wiggle out from under me, I growled and tightened my fingers again to let lightning sear into her neck. She screeched in instant agony, legs kicking wildly, but while she laid clutching at her throat, I stood up and kicked her body until she rolled to lay stomach-down. She let out a fiercely angered noise and her arm shot out to grab at my leg to pull me down, but I was quicker, and promptly stomped down on her spine until she was squealing with pain. I leaned down, quickly shot little bolts into her arms and calves to make sure she wasn't going anywhere for two or three minutes, then raced as quick as I could over to Marco. 

He and Annie were now on their feet, and she was kicking at him and he was swiftly dodging the attacks. He wasn't fighting back, though, and even if I had never seen Annie fight before, I could still tell in the little hesitations and sloppy aiming she still wasn't unleashing everything she had on him. While Hitch may have had been begging to come, I was sure Annie was forced onto the mission.  

"I'm sorry," she said hollowly as she flung her foot up, almost hitting Marco's head and just grazing his ear. "I'm sorry." 

It was weirdly touching, in a way, but we didn't have the time. Annie was distracted with her back to me and focusing on Marco, so pressing my sparking hands in-between her shoulder blades and making her knees buckle was a lot easier than it could've been. Marco's gaze followed her fall to her knees with a shrill sound, but just like the first time we were being hightailed by guards, I grabbed his sleeve and pulled him forwards, running and towing him a step or two behind me. 

Luckily, I knew these woods like the back of my hand, as they were so often my playsite as a child, so I know just where to turn and twist to take Marco and I safely deeper. Every once in a while, I'd hear a rustling from behind us, and I knew they must be hot on our tails.  

But then I remembered what Hitch said about the woods fucking up their noses, and I got an idea.  

"Take off your jacket!" I yelled at him, and when I looked back at him, his eyebrows with knit in confusion. 

"What?" 

"Take it off and throw it off to the side!" I commanded, letting go of his sleeve. I don't think he understood, but he didn't protest, either. I did the same, unzipping the leather and painfully threw it off to my right as far as I could, praying this would work and I could come back for it later.  

Our jackets were the most sweat-soaked things we had on, which meant they were literally dripping with our scent. So if the woods already had too many scents that it was overwhelming them, my first thought was to try to cover ourselves in the scent of the woods and lead the guards astray with objects containing our pure scent. 

So, not wanting to leave a trail even after we dropped our jackets, we veered to the left and went a little deeper because I recognized this bend of the forest and I knew just where to go. As I knew we would, we ran up to a huge tree I would climb up and spend hours in all the time as a kid. I jumped up to grab onto a branch, just high enough that my feet dangled over the ground, and instructed him to climb. He nodded.  

We hoisted ourselves up the godforesaken tree as fast as we could, grunting and panting. I drug my forearm across my forearm to not let my drops of sweat hit the ground. But eventually we shimmied up, with me motioning him when to stop, and sat ourselves in crooks of the stronger branches. I reached up to rip off a handful of leaves and rubbed circles onto my skin and body with them, trying to hide my scent. I wasn't sure how well it would work, but it was better than nothing. Marco observed my movements and followed suit, and then we laid down in a way that the branch would block our bodies. 

And then we waited. 

I didn't make a sound because in addition to hyper seeing and smelling, they also had hyper hearing, like human bloodhounds. So for a while it was eerily silent, with no noise except the deafening thundering of my own pulse. I closed my eyes and let the wind nudge my side, nearly threatening to push me out just for it's own amusement.  

The stretch of silence when I knew they were out there looking for us made my stomach churn with anxiety. I had no way of knowing where they were, only having a quick comment from Hitch to base really anything off. 

I don't know how long in and suddenly, there was a crackle of leaves underfoot, and I went rigid.  

From way out in my peripheral vision to my right, I saw, down on the ground, silver blobs emerge from the trees, at least twenty of them. They raced over to the trees our jackets were propped against, then lifted them up, and I heard at least four of them scream in frustration.  

"It's just their clothes!" came the cry of one, who promptly whipped my precious jacket carelessly at the ground, which made me inwardly whimper.  

"I was so sure we had a scent!" wailed another. 

"We did, it just didn't lead us to _them!_ " hissed back the first one.  

"Does anyone have the scent now, though?" piped up another. 

I didn't even breathe.  

A beat, then a chorus of "No"'s and "Not anything helpful" rippled through the small gathering, and the one who seemed to be the leader sighed and dropped my jacket. "Fine. We'll keep moving. Let's go." The leader turned and ran off beyond where I could see or hear them, and the rest of their little entourage of bitches scurried off into the woods behind them.  

We stayed up in that tree, silent and unmoving, for another ten minutes, just to be sure. But when Marco looked over and me and quietly said, "I think it's alright now", I could've collapsed in relief. 

I shifted around with shaky limbs, quivering arms as I swung myself down from the tree and tried not to double over when I hit the ground. "W-we're alive," I gasped. "Fuck, we're alive, we-." I rubbed at my eyes, wishing my heart would stop trying to crack a rib bone. "We gotta go. It's not safe here anymore." 

I began shuffling over to our jackets, with Marco staying put. "Where do we go?" 

"I don't know anymore." I slipped my arms through my jacket, rubbing at my eyes again and turning towards him. "We'll figure something out." 

We'd always figure something out. 

* * *

Ribbons of illuminated silver twirled down from the moon hanging in the richly dark sky, adorned with sparkling starry jewels etched into the fabric of the night sky. It bathed the town stretching before us in a lustrous glow, the silver moonlight running down the shingles of the building roofs and sparkling on the surface of the water of a well. Midnight's zephyr teased our hair as we sat in the middle of it all, high above the ground like kings on thrones.  

I looked over my shoulder at Marco, who was back-to-back with me as we sat on the roof of an empty building in the middle of Trost we ran across. He met my gaze, and I gestured towards the scene around us. "This is my world." 

He blinked at me, then settled into a soft smile, turning back around. "It's absolutely beautiful." He paused. "Back in Sina, as an interior guard, I never really got to go outside. My sleeping quarters, eating quarters and my job were all in the palace- my whole life was inside one building." He tipped his head up. "I've missed the stars." 

Silence overtook us again, but it was nice. Comfortable. 

I turned my head around to look at him when I felt him start to shake against my back. "You okay?" 

His head was bowed down, and at first, all he did was let out hitched, shaky breaths. Was he crying? "Yeah. I'm fine, thank you." 

My lips pulled into a frown and I spun around to sit so we were side by side. He turned his head away from me, and I felt his body shake harder. "What's wrong?" 

He quivered and paused, hesitating whether to tell me or not, but he turned his head towards me and the moonlight made his tears glint. "I-I just. Annie was my friend." He pursed his lips and his Adams Apple bobbed as he pushed a hard swallow down his throat. "We were trainees together, and the only two out of our top ten graduating class to be selected to be in the same guard division. And today, sh-she was trying to kill me." He shook harder and buried his face in his hands as I watched, silent. "They were all my friends. I recognized all of them, and except Annie, none of them seemed remotely apologetic. They would have me dead on orders and not care, I thought they were my  _friends_." He sniffled and wiped his eyes on his sleeve, his voice cracking as he spoke. "I miss my old life. I miss it so, so bad. I know I'm selfish for saying this, but I hate how corrupt the world is and I want to go back to not being a part of it." 

Somehow while he was talking, our hands had found each other, and our fingers had laced. His hands were warm and soft, and I could not bring myself to mind. 

I rolled my thumb over the back of his hand and gave a light squeeze, drawing in a deep breath. "You've been through a lot of shit." We met eyes. "The world is a really fucked up place, and you were thrown into it out of nowhere. I really can't comfort you and say it gets better, but there's only one thing I can say." I looked down into my lap. "If we keep running, they're going to find us, and they're going to kill us. However, with the search teams of the best guards out on the patrol for us, that means that there are less actually at the palace. And even if I don't know what the hell Pandora's Box is, or even what will happen when I get it, I know that at this point, I have nothing to lose. The two men I have it promised to say they'll use it to turn humanity for the better, and if it's as powerful as legends and the extremely high security around it say, then we should be fine if the Box is in their hands." I sniffed, and our gazes locked again. "I'm done lazing around. I have a job, and now my survival is banking on it, too. I'm leaving to get the Box, and I'm going soon. Tomorrow. The day after, I don't know. But I'm not gonna sit around and wait for them to come kill me themselves." His head was on my shoulder, now, and I gently laid mine against his. "I won't ask you to come with me, if you really don't want to, because I know it goes against everything you've grown up to believe." 

He was quiet for a moment, before doing the subtle gesture of nuzzling against my shoulder with his forehead, and my heart leapt into my throat. "I don't have anything to lose, either."  

And for the first time in what seemed like forever, I smiled.  

We stayed like that for a long, long time, neither of us speaking or moving, but enjoying the warmth and comfort the other provided, until his breathing began to fall slow and easy, and I could tell he was asleep. I almost laughed to myself. He fell asleep sitting on a rooftop. 

I shifted a little to gently let his head fall in my lap so that I could stretch my arms. I knew I'd have to wake him up sooner or later, because sleeping up here was dangerous on a couple of levels, but I'd let him have a little bit of sleep before I did that. I looked down at him, how peaceful and small he looked curled up to me, and my heart twinged at the sharp memory of his earlier words.  

Shakily, I raised my hand, softly brushing my knuckles over his pale, freckled cheek, sighing.  "I'm so sorry," I whispered. "I'm so, so sorry for getting you into this mess. You deserve better, and I'm so sorry." 

I wiped away my own tear with the heel of my hand, breathing in deeply and looking up at the stars.  

I'd go insane if I couldn't see them every night, I thought. 

I didn't know how he did it.


	7. Dog-Eat-Dog

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I don't want to just survive in this sick, twisted, fucked up world I live in.  
> I want to live.

I could've kept playing the denial card, I should've kept playing the denial card. But I wasn't stupid. Even if I tried to bury it under empty self-assurance and hollow promises that nothing had changed, the fact that God knows how I had it bad for Marco would still be a voice drilled into my subconscious, not letting me forget. 

I was so mad at myself for falling for him. It was literally the farthest thing from the plan I could imagine. I was never supposed to even platonically like him, let alone romantically. But try as I did, I couldn't pass these damn butterflies in my stomach off as anything else when we held hands (which we had been doing a lot more often in the couple of days it had been since we got attacked by the guards) or how my heart would hitch with these tender looks he started giving me when he thought I wasn't looking. I had kept true to my word about planning to leave for the Box soon, and after long discussions with too many scrapped battle plan diagrams drawn into dirt with sticks, we decided on going in a day or two. We did another show, which raked us in a heap of coins because I guess word got around, so we refilled on supplies and bought ourselves switchblades.  

I thought I was maybe developing feelings for him before the show, but the show only confirmed it. We moved in the way we had before, completely in-sync and smiling at each other. No words or signals were needed. And flipping mid-air, our eyes would meet, and the world would slow around us. My pulse would stumble over itself as it quickened, my heart quivering and my head going light as I caught the stars in his eyes and was mesmerized, drawn to him and spinning in his pull. Mid-air is when I realized I had feelings for a member of my sworn enemy who had loathed me as much I had him. And realizing it was either a very, very bad idea, or a very good one. 

And to tell you the truth, I was pretty sure he liked me back. He'd give me these half-discreet previously mentioned goo goo eyes, and since the night on the rooftops, he smiled a lot more around me and we didn't fight at all. We even started sleeping under the same blanket- using the justification that it was "for warmth". Let no lies be told though, it  _was_  warmer with us curled up to each other. 

We were both at the stage where we knew that what we were doing was no longer even friendship. Yet, we stayed quiet about it. After all, you could always be wrong. 

But it was hard to stay quiet. Not when every little smile, every little head tilt, every brush of his hand and every rush to my head was making me fall in love with him. 

And it hurt. Falling in love wasn't soft, it wasn't warm. It wasn't gentle and sunlight on your back and wind in your hair and heartbeats in your throat. It was tooth and claw, nails on skin and burn on your flesh. It was blades in your throat every time you swallowed and fire scorching in your veins and a pain so intense you ask yourself why you're so addicted to its rush.  

And you hate yourself when you look at him because you never wanted this.  

We had planned how to get the Box, now. It wasn't anything mastermind-ish, or even shockingly strategical, as nothing like that would work when there was two of us against who knows how many guards in a palace. It was more mapping out how we'd enter the palace. I told him about the hidden entrance in the abandoned watch tower, of which he blinked at and murmured under his breath how shocked he was that no one had caught that that existed yet.  

But we laid there, hand in hand, on the rooftop of a building, which had been our normal spot to sit since we got kicked out of the woods. Since then, we've been sleeping in other patches of woods scattered around Trost and even dense meadows.  

This rooftop was flat enough for us to lay down on our backs, fingers thoughtlessly twining at our sides as we stared up at the sky hazing with twilight. My heart was racing and tripping over itself in my chest as we did, tongue pressed to the top of my mouth. We didn't speak until Marco opened his mouth. (His goddamn fucking mouth that I wanted to kiss again.) "We're leaving tomorrow, aren't we?" 

I pursed my lips. Tomorrow was what we had settled on, and thinking about it scared the shit out of me. We were both silently aware of how dangerous this was, and how easily we could die doing it. I was terrified out of my mind and tried everything to not think about it. I was just twenty two, Marco was only twenty three, which even in this hellhole of disease and famine was way too young to die. I've never been big on the whole "sacrifice for the good of humanity at a moment's notice", because I still had my life ahead of me and I wasn't willing to toss it away. But if it came down to keep running and dying for certain or taking some crazy gamble to maybe, just maybe live, then I had nothing to lose. After all, Erwin and Levi had been doing it for years. "Yeah. We're doing it tomorrow," I confirmed. "Are you ready?" I asked him before he could ask me and I had the chance to change my mind. 

There was a moment of hesitation before he answered. "Yes," he replied quietly. "I'm scared, but I'm trying not to think about it too much." He tipped his head over to look at me and my stomach flipped. "Jean? Please be honest with me right now, because this will be fatal tomorrow if not; do you really and truly trust me enough to take me with you?"  

Our gazes locked, and in his eyes flickered fear. Fear of rejection. I took my bottom lip between my teeth and drew in a deep breath. "I trust you just enough."  

His mouth twitched in the beginnings of a smile never elaborated on. He looked back up at the sky and sighed contently. "We've come a long way, then, from you hating my guts to trusting me enough to take me with you on a mission like this, even if it is only just by a little bit." He closed his eyes, then snapped them open and blinked rapidly at me. "Do you- do you still hate me?" 

I didn't hate him to alarming extent, actually. I let go of his hand to run my palms down my face and grunt. "No. You're tolerable." 

"Tolerable. That's the sweetest thing you've said to me, actually, which is pretty horrible." There was a joking tone in his voice, and I chuckled in spite of myself. 

My hand crawled towards his and our fingers slipped together again. "Well, if tomorrow crashes and burns, might as well not go out hating my suicide mission partner." 

He laughed. Actually, full-out laughed, and it was a beautiful sound. "I think past the anger and violence and borderline psychopathic tendencies, you're a good person, Jean." He trailed off into quietness for a moment and when he spoke again, his voice was low and coated with raw sorrow.  "I wish we could've been friends." 

And those short, simple six words broke my heart. 

He had been a good person from the very start. The very first time I met him, he refused to kill me and let me go because he was too pure a soul to kill another human being, when anyone else would've done it. Since then, all he ever did was try to uphold his morals in a strange and scary new world laden with corruption that could only be survived in through violence and immortality. He had tried to be helpful and kind to me and purposefully did everything he could to not bring up any of his privileged background or provoke me at all. He provided me with a distinction between right and wrong that I lacked, and he stayed with me through all of it when he could've left at any time.  

And all I did to him was lash out. Used him as a channel for my anger, berated him for everything, hated him for everything he never did and told him to leave. But when we worked together, when we did our shows, magic happened. I knew he was far better a person than I, and I had no idea why he was still here at my side.  

And in all the time we had been together of fighting and screaming and tears and breakdowns, it was the night before we were going to die that I finally realized that I loved him.  

If I just could've gotten over myself earlier, and we could've spent our time as friends, as something maybe even more than friends. I had wasted every second we had had together, and I hated myself for it far more than I ever hated him. 

I turned to lay on my side, clinging to him and burying my face in his shoulder all of a sudden, wanting to feel his warmth and listen to his heartbeat just once before I marched in to a palace to die. He let out a soft, surprised noise, but I only curled up to his side and squeezed his hand. "Me too," I mumbled into his coat. "I'm so, so sorry for everything. For how I treated you. For what I've done to you. And most of all, for what I got you into." 

I didn't know how he would react. If he would shove me off, wrench himself away. But the one thing I never could've anticipated was his other hand on the small of my back, him turning on his side to face me, and gently drawing me closer to him, nestling me up against his chest. My eyes blinked open and heart caught in my throat. "I won't lie," he began in a soothing tone. "This past month and a half has been hard. Harder for me than any other test I've ever been put through in my life. But...in a weird way, I think I've benefitted from it."  _Benefitted?_ I blinked up at him. "I would've lived my entire life completely sheltered from what the rest of the world really is. I would've been naive and ignorant to my dying day. I don't like how corrupt it is, I hate it. But I'd rather know then spend the entire rest of my life under some false vision that everything is perfect." He shifted around and brought me a little closer to him. I swallowed hard, his pulse drumming against my ear. "And for what it's worth, Jean, I'm glad I met you." 

All I thought about after he said that was how badly I wanted to kiss him. How aching I was to hold his face to mine and get lost in his taste and smell again. To be overwhelmed by him. And if we really only had one night left, I had nothing to lose. 

"Marco," I said quietly, "I want you to tell me exactly how you feel about me, because I want to know if how I feel about you is requited. And even if it's not, I'd rather die knowing for sure than dying to a thought of 'what if'." 

A silent pause shattered the sound and cracked my nerves into shards to scatter in my bloodstream. I could've been wrong. I could've been wrong. 

"I like you, Jean, but not in the way I think you might like me." 

His words were gentle and careful, and could be taken two ways. One way could be the words I wanted to hear. The other would make me turn away and not speak to him again, not even look at him again for the rest of the night in shame.  

"I want to kiss you, Marco." 

A laugh. Short, curt, hiccuping laughter. 

"I guess I was wrong, then. I'm glad." 

I didn't know who initiated the kiss, but it wasn't important. 

My eyes were closed and my hand was in his hair as he held me to him as we laid on our sides on a rooftop at twilight, jaws opening and closing against each other in a slow rhythm that strung my nerves out raw on a wire. Our electric twin heartbeats raced as they pressed together, and I hooked an arm around the back of his neck, willing him to kiss the breath out of my lungs and stars into my vision. 

Tongue and teeth, edging me into a craze, clouding my mind and curling my hands into fists as if clinging to him would anchor me back to reality. I breathed his name into his mouth and he swallowed it whole, his tongue chasing after the word. I was on my back, now, him propping himself over me and no innocence to this kiss could even begin to be feigned. I drank in the dark desire and deep desperation to this, from him, to him. We could die tomorrow, so we had this night to kiss life into each other.  

Hands roamed, and I arched and shuddered as his hand slid up and off my hip and fingers trailed up my spine, stroking a tight circle into that sensitive spot in between my shoulder blades that pulsed shivers through my body and made me mewl against his mouth. He slid his mouth down, away from my lips, and I whined. "Is that good?" he whispered against my jaw. My nod was breathless, and my hands fisted tighter into the fabric of his coat. 

I tipped my head back as lips trailed open-mouthed down the slant of my jaw, his kisses wet and heated as they mouthed to my throat. It felt good, weirdly good, and I couldn't help the groan tugged from my vocal cords. It was barely anything so far, but even with just this, this was more attention than I usually got during this sort of thing. I would always go straight to focusing everything I had on pleasing my partner to make sure they were satisfied and if they were busy squeezing their eyes shut and gasping as I was nipping over their sensitive spots or had my head between their legs, then maybe they wouldn't notice how badly I would be trembling, or how bad I looked from another angle. It had always been a self-conscious thing, but all that melted away as he whispered that I was beautiful to my throat as I shivered with his tongue tracing the ridges of my vibrating vocal cords.  

His head dipped down further, nosetip trailing down the sensitive skin and I breathlessly glided my hands up his spine. A small, fluttery gasp left his lips, which traveled down my body in little shuddery tingles right to my dick. I saw his Adam's Apple bob as he swallowed, picking his head up again and staring down at me with half-lidded eyes and kiss-glistening lips and every vein in my body is on fire and I wanted him  _so bad._ "Is this okay?" he breathed against the hollow of my throat, ducking his head back down, and I slipped my fingers into his hair and curled them.  

I could've verbally responded, and I probably should've. But the temptation to  _show_ him my answer and not just  _tell_ him was too strong. Gritting my teeth, I planted my elbows into the rough surface of the rooftop for leverage as I lifted my hips up to grind against his. 

The moans that came from both of us were choked and surprised, our eyes shooting open as we snapped our heads around to look at each other at the tiny, squirmy bolt of pleasure from the action. His mouth was open in a small 'O' shape, and I was sure I couldn't have looked much different. We blinked at each other, silent, and I pushed a shaky swallow down my throat, suddenly embarrassed as I slowly repeated the action. I brought my hips up shyly to slide against his, swallowing hard and head turning to the side as I bit back a blush as I shuddered from the pleasure because our cocks rubbing together- even if it was through four layers- still felt  _amazing_. I closed my eyes and groaned softly, trying to dull out how bad I was trembling from nervousness, before I heard a breathless gasp by my ear, and then there were soft lips on mine. 

Something clenched inside of me eased up, just a little, as he kissed me softly and sweetly, kissed me into relaxing just a little more, kissed me into loving him just a little more. I shifted to put my hands on his shoulders, sliding them to his chest, up over his collarbones and bunching them in his scarf. And slowly, slowly, so that he had time to protest if he wanted to, I pulled it off. The brown fabric I had removed from his neck balled in my fist, I kissed him harder, needier, nipping at his bottom lip and I knew he got the idea. The kiss broke, our foreheads tapping together as our breath fanned over the other's lips. We were quiet, but no words were needed.  

My fingers picked at the buttons of his cream felt coat, popping them open as I pressed my lips to his jaw. I popped them open, fingers spreading on his chest over the light-colored button-up he had on underneath. We breathed out in unison, and he let out a heart-stopping whimper as I gently scratched over the pert buds on his chest. I swallowed dryly as I helped him shrug his coat off his shoulders, then plucked open his shirt and wiggled down to slide my mouth open-mouthed down the middle line of his chest, stopping to let my tongue trace spider webs over his pounding heart. 

Marco quivered above me, biting his lip and burying his face in my hair, making tiny vocalizations from within his throat. I twisted my hips and shifted my weight, rolling us over so I hovered on top of him and mouthed my way down his abs. I gave extra attention to the faded lavender, jagged scar on his ribs that resembled the lightning it had been created from. Warm fingers slide into my hair and I hummed contently, loving the feeling of his digits combing gently through my locks. I nuzzled my nose against his flat and extremely well-toned stomach, then dipping down to nuzzle down his happy trail. I flicked my eyes up to him (his teeth were biting into his lower lip and his cheeks were bright red and his eyes were huge,  _wow_ ) as my chin brushed the material of his waistband. "Is this okay?" I asked quietly, and he tightly nodded, his fists clenching.  

More eager with his permission granted than I tried to let on, I undid his pants and pulled them down his thighs, giving the bulge in his pants some relief  _oh my god, holy fucking shit, the bulge in his pants._ I tried not to ogle, I did, but he was fucking  _packing,_ what the fuck. I blinked at the clothed tent, furrowing my brows before looking back up at him, scowling. "Okay, this isn't fucking fair." 

Marco's hands were covering his face, save for the fact that his fingers were spread so he could peek through them. "Huh?" he squeaked. 

"You're not supposed to have kids, right? Or sex at all?"  

Marco swallowed, and looked to the side. "No. The King wants to make sure his genetically enhanced population is very controlled, because, you know, it can be passed on. He only wants the people who have genetic enhancements to be handpicked." 

"Right, right. You signed up to be a fucking  _nun-_ which, by the way, you're doing a horrible job at- and you have a huge dick. That's not fair." 

"Well, we're putting it to use now, right?" 

Silence fell between us, us blinking at each other. I didn't speak mostly because I was stunned that he just fucking said that. I almost laughed. 

My eyes went straight back to the prize, though, trying to figure out just what to do.  _Do I...touch it? Should I just jerk him off? Fuck._ _Maybe if I...uh..._  

So someway, somehow, the next thing I knew, his boxers were around his knees and his dick was in my mouth. And considering I still have no idea what the fuck happened between his dick not being in my mouth and then his dick being in my mouth, it must be considered, for all intents and purposes, accidental. In fact, let's just consider the whole act of this blowjob accidental, as I didn't really  _mean_ to suck his cock or had any idea  _how_ any of this was happening but lo and behold, cock in my mouth.  

There's no way that I can really make any of this sound sexy, because it really wasn't. I had never given a blowjob to anyone before, and I had been way too fucked out and hazy-headed when girls had done it to me in the past to really pay attention to how they were doing it. So I just improvised, bobbing my head up and down the underside of his cock and trailing my tongue with my movements, brows still furrowed as I tried to figure out what to do after that.  

Marco didn't mind, though. He was somehow arching up and moaning, gasping out that it felt good, which was way better reception that I anticipated. I tried to thinking about how I got myself off, and tried emulating that with my tongue, tilting my head to give lavish strokes to the sides of his shaft. His still-gloved hands rolled against my scalp. His thighs clenched around my shoulders, and I swallowed down a gulp as I moved up to pop the head of his cock in my mouth and slowly tongue the slit. 

" _Jean_." A trembling, sudden moan of my name filled the air, cracked and breathless and  _so hot, so goddamn hot_ and it must've felt really good for him because his hips bucked and his hands in my hair yanked involuntarily. My head tipped back and I let out a little gasp because- okay, this will sound weird, but in the moment, I swear to it!- it...it kind of really felt good. 

Instantly, he let go of my hair, hands shooting up to his mouth. "I'm sorry! I didn't mean to yank, I-" 

"Do it again," I gasped before I could stop myself, reaching up to grab his wrists, setting his hands on my hair and quickly shuffled back down to sink my head down his dick before he could say anything. 

He let out a deep, guttural groan, and when he pulled at my hair, I let out a similar noise around the length of him. Running on logic, I suckled what I had in my mouth, and given that there was no way in hell I was going to fit all of it in my mouth because I had a gag reflex and hacking around his dick would be generally unappealing, I wrapped my hand around the base and gave short pumps up and down. Marco arched up, thighs on my shoulders twitching, as he moaned, rolling up his hips into my mouth. I moved with him, bobbing my head and trying to swallow him down more, make him feel even better. He was squirming underneath me and I had to pin his hips down to keep him still. I figured out the head of his dick was his most sensitive area, so I pulled back to wrap my lips around it, sucking gently as I tongued him, my hand coating in my own saliva as I moved it up and down his shaft. And it pushed him over the edge. 

A sharp, pleasurable yank on my hair, and his hips jerked up as he let out a cry that cracked halfway through the delivery, and my mouth, which I stupidly had forgotten to detach, was filled with hot and generally unpleasant tasting liquid.  

It's weird, never thinking you'd fall for a guy, then two months later having one orgasm in your mouth.  

'Spitters are quitters', as the age old saying that even I knew goes, but I was never super persistent anyway. Gross as it probably was, I turned around and spat the cum in my mouth out behind me, hacking and wiping my mouth on my sleeve. I made a face, then shook my head, and turned back to Marco, and what laid before me either sped my heartbeat up two times as fast or stopped it completely; I'm not sure which one it was. 

He was on his back, propped up on his elbows, with the most gorgeous fucked out expression on his flushed face. His eyes were half-lidded and his irises were blown wide and full, his stomach rising and falling with his shallow, rapid breaths. His mouth was slightly open and a trail of drool slicked the corner of his lips down to his chin and his hair was sticking up in all directions from me running my fingers through it and plastering with sweat.  

And suddenly I hated the fact that I was still fully clothed because shit, my hard-on was  _very apparent_ and hurt  _very much._  

Marco swallowed and sat up, rubbing his hands into his eyes and running his hands through his hair, catching his breath. "Wow. That was...um." His head tilted shyly up, a tiny smile on his lips. "That was really nice. Thank you, Jean."  

"Yeah," I said back, almost comically simply. I just sucked his dick and he just came in my mouth and all I could say was  _'Yeah'_. 

Marco blinked slowly, then tilted his head, his tongue flicking out to moisten his lips. "Can I return the favor? Or are you not comfortable with that?" 

"Yeah!" I said back, almost comically eager. I just sucked his dick and he just came in my mouth and he was offering to do something back and all I could say was  _'Yeah'_.  

He smiled at me, eyes gentle, then looked back and tucked himself back into his pants, letting out a deep breath. Then he shifted around and spread his legs out in a wide V, patting the space in between his thighs. "Wanna come here? With your back to my chest." 

I assumed he was going to suck me off as well, but guessing from the position he suggested, he had other things in mind. Getting to my hands and knees, I crawled over, shrugging off my leather jacket before I turned and pressed my back to his bare front, feeling the warmth of his skin radiate to mine through my T-shirt. I was going to turn my head to look at him and ask what now, but the words caught in my throat as the teeth scraping over the back of my neck erased them from my mind. "O-oh," I stuttered dumbly, trying not to squirm from the heat tingling down my spine. The teeth turned into lips, gently mouthing against the sensitive skin, before making a seal and  _sucking._ My heart was fluttering hummingbird wings against my ribs as I attempted to keep my head from lolling back to rest on his shoulder. His hands were free, as I was quickly reminded as he slid them down my sides, then back up, then back down to rest on my hips. I let out a small puff of air, then a dry laugh. "Coppin' a feel?" 

I felt him smile on my nape. "I'd like to."  

"I'd like you to, too. Oh, and just a heads up, I'm pretty sensitive." I turned my head and grinned cheekily, challengingly at him, wiggling a little up against him and the fingers on my hips tightened. "So make good use of that, yeah?"  

Just like me earlier, he answered, but non-verbally, and I couldn't find it in me to complain. 

He tugged his black gloves off with his teeth (which was fucking hot as it was) I breathed out shakily as his fingers traced the hem of my shirt, before nudging it to slip his hands under, gliding his soft palms up my spine. God, that felt good, and I arched and dug my nails into his thighs as they pressed small circles in between my shoulderblades and I full-out moaned. "That's good..." I sighed, letting my eyes slip shut and humming contently in pleasure.   

His mouth went back to nipping at my neck, and his hands roved from tracing the flexing muscles of my back and crawling up the ridges of the ladder of my spine to my front. They rubbed at the hollows of my hips, before lightly dragging up over my tensing stomach. I squirmed and squeezed my eyes shut even tighter as they stroked over my muscles there. "Wow," he breathed in my ear. "You're super toned..." 

"Y-yeah, well, you did the shows w-with me, you should know that they're not exactly easy on full-body physical demand. And they're h-how I've been making pocket change for years, but thanks." My cheeks were so fucking red and I was so turned on by how he was ghosting his fingerpads over my skin, a touch so light it was barely there but just enough to make me shiver and arch against him in a silent plea for more. I whined and tensed as his fingers draw lazy lines over my thumping heart until I was sure it was pounding so hard it'd fracture a rib. Then back down they traveled, crawling up my sides again but this time taking time to map out my ribs too. I was practically trembling  _before_  he pressed a grin into the base of my neck as he rubbed slowly over my perked up nipples. 

" _Jesus_ ," I breathed to no one in particular, hips restlessly trying to rock forward and having nothing to grind against, which was super fucking frustrating. However, I was never one for class, and if I needed to get off, then I was going to get off. I reached a hand down between my legs, desperate for some stimulation, except Marco wasn't too keen on that- his hand darted out to wrap around my wrist and pull my hand back.  

I choked out a sharp noise of angry protest, but Marco brushed his lips over the shell of my ear and spoke in a hushed, husky voice. "Ah-ah-ah," he chided softly, and I was dimly aware of his right hand sliding down my front. "Let me do that." 

His hand pressed down right where I needed it to, and I was shameless as I was thoughtless in lifting up my hips to grind against it, desperate for friction. He rubbed his hand down on me and I tossed my head back and moaned, fists curling. I rolled my aching need up to his palm, finally getting some alleviation, and I could've screamed of frustration when his hand was gone. 

"Don't _tease!_ " I whined breathlessly, trying to reach back to grab his hand and put it back but he laughed and drew it out of my reach. 

"Have a little patience, Jean! I'm not done yet, don't worry." He nuzzled along the peach fuzz hairs on my neck and I groaned. "A little patience might do you some good."  

"Then get to it," I hissed through gritted teeth. He made up his mind to be merciful, and his nimble digits which I  _really wanted wrapped around me_ picked open the button to my jeans. 

My teeth bit into my lower lip and I breathed through my nose, closing my eyes as his fingers slipped under the waistband of my boxers, closing around the base of my dick and stroking little circles onto my shaft with his thumb. 

That felt so good, god, and it sent me convulsing into tiny shivers and my breathing quickened. But it was light and small and I needed more. "Hnn..." I breathed as I tipped my head back. "Do more." 

And his thumb rubbed tighter circles, before he pulled his fingers back into a tight ring and slowly pumped them up and down me.  

"Ah!" Shivering under his touch, my hips rocked up against him, lip trembling, hands trembling. My mind was hazing in my ringing skull, and tiny moans tumbling out of my mouth. "Ah, shit, M...Marco, please, just..." 

The digits loosened around to stroke gentle fingertips up the underside, and my eyes could've rolled into my head. I bucked, although I was barely aware of it, and my mouth fell open in a silent cry. His teeth nipped at my ear. "You like this, right, Jean?" came his low words, making me whimper. "You're so responsive, it's so amazing..." I almost screamed when his thumb dragged through the bead of precum on the head of my cock, then smeared it over my slit.  

"H-holy shit," I gasped, and the euphoric sensation only became more intense as his other hand slipped back under my shirt, roving all the spots he figured out were sensitive on my chest and sides. Trailing his touch lightly down my ribs, leaving goosebumps to appear in his wake. "Fuck." Doing the only thing I could think to, I craned my head around, trying to capture his lips in a kiss that could probably convey how I was feeling better than any half-assed verbiage coming out of my mouth. 

He obliged, at first, our lips locking and tongues twining and teeth biting but he pulled back and I chased him with my mouth. But I was only met with air, and I cried out as he was stroking me again, both on my dick and over my nipples. There was no way I was going to be able to keep up stamina here with him doing that.  

"I'm gonna- fuck!" I couldn't even finish my sentence,  moaning and groaning and mewling and whimpering because it felt so good and it felt so  _much_ , all over my body. But he knew. I could feel that damn smile. His hand moved at a faster pace, and his index finger rolled the buds on my chest and scratched down my sides. I gasped out his name, over and over, getting closer and closer to spilling with every pump. "Marco!  _Marco!_ Marco I'm-!" 

His hand let go of me. His other hand slipped out of my shirt. His teeth were off my skin.  

Every time I had tried jacking off in this story so far, as you should know, it's been interrupted by me having some sort of psychological interruption. And just when it looked like for once I could get off, questioning everything about myself free, he stops. 

"...Marco." 

"Yes?" There is a laugh in his voice. 

"I'm absolutely going to kill you." 

"Jean." He tilts my chin around to look at him, and I glare death at him, while he just looks at me fondly with soft eyes. "There's...there's one more thing that I want to do, if you're alright with it." He brushes his nose over my jaw, and despite being mad, I shiver. "Jean, I asked you if you truly trust me enough to complete this mission with me. You said yes. I'd like to test that." 

* * *

The sex wasn't like anything I had ever experienced before. 

It was mind-numbing and nerve-shattering, painful and pleasurable like I can't even begin to describe. I was so lost in the sensation and so lost in him as he breathed a wreath of sweet nothings to curl around my head as he moved inside of me, slow and gentle. Kisses fluttered over my shoulders, my tensing muscles veneered in a sheen of sweat. I writhed under him, crying out as he struck the sweet spot inside of me and set fire to my veins over and over. I was a shaking mess, and our hands laced and heartbeats chased each other as we held each other close until we were seeing stars. 

But the sex wasn't like anything I had ever experienced before for more reasons than that, because it wasn't sex at all. 

It was making love. 

* * *

The morning afterwards, awoken by the sun on our faces dappling through the meadow full of tall grass we had curled up into, was sleepy and giggly.  

Our noses bumped each other, and our mouths pressed together smiling, and we laughed into the crooks of each other's necks.  

We had to leave for the Box today, we knew that. But we didn't have to leave right away, did we?  

Later, we whispered into each other's mouths. Later, we murmured over the other's skin. Later, we promised into each other's ears as we clung to each other and shuddered. 

* * *

My knuckles rapped against the door, closing my eyes and hoping for the best. 

As anticipated, it swung open to a tall blonde man with piercing ice blue eyes and eyebrows that could probably cause an earthquake if they wiggled too much. "Jean?" 

"I'm going today," I said quietly. "I'm going again. Me and him. I want you and Levi to come with us." 

His gaze flicked from me, to my dark-haired lover behind me, eyebrows furrowing. "You..." Marco made a small whimpering noise because he could tell what he was about to say just by Erwin's tone. "You were a guard." His voice, always calm, had taken on a disturbing hint of belligerence, and I cringed. "I don't forget a face. What are you doing here? Jean, what happened?" 

His sharp eyes were back on me, and they burned the skin they fell upon. "I-I," I choked out. "I have a lot of explaining to do. A lot went down since I last saw you.  _A lot_. And, um. He's on our side now. Just let me talk, and don't interrupt, because I have a lot of it to do, and we don't have much time until we have to leave." 

* * *

Later came far too soon. The four of us stood shoulder-to-shoulder in the empty street of Sina we had emerged from the ground of, moonlight of a far clearer sky than I could ever have dreamed of washing over us. Marco let out a soft breath, and I could only imagine how he felt right now. Finally returning to his home only to take it down. 

The silver of the great palace looming above the buildings glowed in the starlight, illuminating it as a beacon above the district. My fists clenched, stomach dropping with nervousness.  

"That's where we're headed," Erwin said next to me quietly, then turned his head to us. "Are you all ready? Have your communication devices on?" 

The communication devices were my idea, by the way. I figured that if any of us got separated, we'd still need a way to talk to each other, and granted that Levi and Erwin had them on hand from missions in the past, we could put them to use as long as Erwin didn't fucking drop out in the middle of it like he did the first time (so, so long ago). We all supplied him with nods. 

Levi was still eyeing Marco with a harsh glint in his eye, which betrayed that he didn't fully trust him yet. Understandable, but he was going to need to work with him at the very least if we were going to get this done. "Yeah," Levi murmured gruffly back, and Marco flinched a little. Marco wasn't exactly comfortable around Levi, which was obvious. Again, understandable. The dude was scary as fuck.  

"Yes," Marco answered shakily, trembling. My heart wrenched. This was probably a lot for him.  

"Alright. As always, we will enter through the abandoned watch tower. And then Marco, I trust that you will lead us straight to what we search for, in the route that will give us the most amount of guards." Something in Erwin's eyes flash as he craned his head to stare Marco down, and even I swallowed at the intensity of it. "You will do so if you are truly on our side. Understand that if you show the slightest waver towards the side of Sina, you must be considered an enemy, and therefore will force us to resort to drastic measures to remove you from the mission." 

My eyes snapped open as I whipped my head around at Erwin. "What? You can't- you wouldn't kill him." Marco gripped onto my wrist. 

My response was a snarl from Levi. "You've been swinging some lucky shit, given what both of you have gone through and are still here. But there was never any mercy involved, except for Marco's. We can't  _afford_ for there to be mercy here. They killed your father, Jean." 

I gritted my teeth. 

There was quiet for a few beats, before Erwin spoke up again, his voice low and hushed. "I don't wish to kill any living being, Jean. I've lost many loved ones of my own. But if it comes to survival in self-defense, I will do what is necessary to keep myself and the ones I care about alive, even if it means killing. And I expect the same from all of you."

In a deafening lack of any sound at all, we all began walking up the street. My head was bowed, and my hands were shaking. 

Marco was the only guard who wouldn't kill on orders, so if I was in the same situation, I wouldn't live it unless I killed them before they could kill me. 

It's a sick, sick dog-eat-dog world, I thought, forced to walk into it either dying or killing. 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you all so much for all the support and feedback for this story, it means a lot to me!! ;A;  
> so anyway, writing this chapter was very fun, and i hope you all enjoyed it. im also looking forward to the next chapter, where, as you mightve guessed, the action will REALLY pick up.  
> in other news, [PLEASE LISTEN TO THIS INCREDIBLE PANDORAS BOX FANMIX IM SCREAMING SO MUCH](http://8tracks.com/gaaradical/c-s-x-s)  
> so yeah. as always, i have a [tumblr](http://yunishinoya.co.vu/), a [twitter](https://twitter.com/flintlocking), the fic tag for this is #fic: pb, comments are extremely appreciated, and thank you very much for reading!!


	8. 'When', Not 'If'

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I never should've gone after the Box.  
> And just please, please know that it's all the biggest regret of my life.

We walked in pins-and-needles silence.  

Every time my foot collided with the disgustingly gold-paved street, bolts of scraping heat would fire up my body and my stomach would drop lower. I was marching myself to certain death- even worse,  _their_ certain death.  

I was quiet. I tried not to speak, and I didn't pick up my head to look at anything but the ground below my feet where I walked. I was so scared I could cry. If I opened my mouth, I was afraid of my fear escaping my lips. I couldn't be afraid. This was my idea.  

God, I wished it was just me and Marco here, that I could speak without Erwin and Levi breathing down my neck so that I could hold his face in my hands and tell him everything I never got the chance to and probably never would.  _I love you,_ I would've whispered to him, stopping in my tracks to look in his eyes and get lost in the hazelnut-gold sea, impossibly perfect like everything about him.  _I love you, I love you, and I might be asking you to die. I'm sorry for what I've done to you, and I wish I had more than last night to show that. I want you to save yourself,_ please,  _just this once, focus on saving no one but you._  

 _You are the best thing that's ever happened to me._  

I said nothing.  

And forward we continued- delusional playthings of fate trying to make a difference in a world gone corrupt to the core.  

A light breeze teased my hair and ghosted tendrils over my skin, making me shiver and shove my hands into my pockets. At some point during our solemn stroll up to where the palace sat, Erwin and I had shifted a few paces behind Marco and Levi, side-by-side and set at a faster walking pace in front of us, leaving feasible distance in between. I was walking pretty slow, after all, and I guess Erwin matched my pace. I was far from being in any rush. I was so far zoned out and far too deep in the glum solace of my own mind, I barely noticed our positions until Erwin was murmuring words into my temple and I jumped, biting a knuckle not to yelp. 

"You have been with him and him alone for the past two months?" 

No, Erwin, Marco invited over all his guard buddies to hang with us. We set up a nightclub. "Yeah," I grunted back, hand over my thundering, startled heart. I was about to question why he was asking, but stopped myself on consideration that I wasn't really in the mood for talking.  

He, however, was. When he spoke again, his voice had dropped to a quieter tone, barely qualifying as a low whisper muttered against the shell of my ear. "You are in a sexual relationship with him." As soon as the words left his mouth, I tensed up and the panic alarms pounded and everything got quiet as blood roared in my ears  _he didn't know that he wasn't supposed to know about us how did-_ "The bruises on both of your necks are unnatural and you're walking oddly. It's not difficult to piece together." 

The feeling I was expecting was embarrassment, as would be expected of my situation. But the feeling I got, beyond explanation, was  _anger_. Baring my teeth, I stopped in my tracks and whipped a glare to lash against Erwin's face. "What? What about it?" I hissed. I couldn't deny it but I was so irrationally annoyed that he brought it up. It was my personal business and he shouldn't have made any comment about it,  _especially_ sounding so cold about it.  

His brows furrowed as he slowed to a stop beside me, our eye contact tense. "As much as I'd love to believe in optimistic ideals, I can't afford not to expect the worse. I pray to any greater force listening that it won't happen, but until we know for sure, I have to assume he will be swayed to their side again once he's in contact with them. He has lived his entire life a guard and has only had two months away from that. And even if as much happened in such little time as you said it did, it's hard for a person to change that completely and utterly." 

He was right. He was right he was right he was right and I didn't want to listen.  "You- you don't know that," I said, pushing the words out over a hard swallow. "You-" 

"No, I don't. And I'm hoping that I'm wrong. But if you're in a relationship with him, no matter the depth, it means you trust him. And I don't want you to end up hurt and I don't want you joining him if he-" 

"Shut up!" I lunged forward before I could stop myself, hands fisting in the front of his coat, angry,  _angry._ Marco and Levi had stopped walking and were turned around, gawking at us, and I couldn't find it in me to fucking care. Erwin wasn't even resisting, goddammit, he just stared at me as I pulled him down to growl right in his goddamn face. "Stop thinking this! Stop thinking shit like this! You don't even sound human when you talk like this!" Humans spoke with empathy, with compassion, with emotion and he didn't- he-. 

"I'm hardwired to think strategically." His voice was soft, he wasn't getting mad, it pissed me off. His eyes drifted down to meet mine. They were not cold. They were not hard. They were soft, and warm. "When I don't, I lose. That's when I lost your father, Jean, and I regret every single day not being able to save him. And the only thing I can do now is everything in my power to protect his only son, who I care for as my own." 

I was still for a couple seconds. And by the time Marco and Levi had walked over, I was trembling like a leaf in the wind, nose buried in Erwin's shoulder as he wrapped his arms around me and gently pressed his mouth to the crown of my hair. 

Everything came spilling out. I sobbed into his shoulder about how scared I was. How much I didn't want to do this and how terrified I was that there were actual living people who would be delighted by nothing more than having my warm, red blood ooze between their fingers. He told me he knew. He told me he had been living with that exact same feeling for years, and my heart broke even further.  

It was a long time before I let go of Erwin, still a shaky, sniffling mess, warm from his hold. Levi asked if I was okay, and I replied with a tense nod. Marco, behind me, rubbed small, comforting circles into my back until my breathing resembled normal again in any way, shape or form. I wasn't okay, but I could try to play that off as a momentary collapse and that I was fine, I was fine. I wasn't okay, but I could pretend. 

I wanted to hold Marco's hand on the walk up, and I did for a little bit. But the quiet was tearing me apart, and nothing was bringing me down further into insanity than the seed of doubt, the seed of distrust Erwin had planted in the back of my mind. It was stupid, and I tried rationalizing with myself that it was wrong, but I let go of his hand anyway and I couldn't look him in the eye. 

He had sworn not to let me touch the Box on his life when we first met. Was two months really and truly enough time to invalidate a lifetime? 

As much as I wanted to find out, I didn't at all. 

* * *

The walk was long and grueling and left far too much time for me to think.  

The first step of the journey I wasn't confident in myself, but I was sure of what I was doing. And by the first step into the watch tower entrance, I wasn't either.  

Luckily, it was night, so the amount of guards out was lesser to begin with. Coming from the pipes must've fucked with the wall guards' noses, so we weren't detected. Nobody was out on the streets and Erwin and Levi had shown us all the hiding spots, so somehow, we were able to silently pass through the town to the bottom of the great, grassy hill where the palace was situated on.  

I trailed at the back as we opened the trap door and filed silently down the stairs, palms sweating as I clenched them.  _I want to go back home. I don't want to be here. I never should've gone in the first place._  

I said nothing. 

We descended the tight, closed staircase twirling down and into the palace as quietly as we could, and the loudest sound was my heart drumming in my chest.  

"S-so," came Marco softly in front of me somewhere. I squinted and held up my palm, rubbing my fingers together to conjure a little sparking ball of blue lightning to hover just above my skin. It wasn't a lot of light, but it gave off just enough to ensure I wouldn't trip. "If this spits us out where I think it will, we're going to want to make a right down the corridor there. The Box is kept in the most highly guarded place in the whole palace- and protected by the most talented of us, too." He paused. "The...the most talented of the guards."  

He corrected himself. He went back to change 'us' to 'them'. I hoped,  _god, I hoped_ Erwin heard it. 

We all came to a gradual stop. I heard some boot scuffling against dirty stone and took it to mean Erwin and Levi turning around. I held up my hand, the dim light illuminating Marco at a halt in front of me while Levi and Erwin faced him expectantly. Right. Marco was the one giving us instructions. I almost forgot that. 

"Right corridor," Levi repeated slowly, the crease etched into his forehead deepening as his pencil-line eyebrows knit together. "I thought that was a dead end." 

Nervously rubbing his index finger to up to the underside of his nose, Marco gave a tight shake of his head. "No, it leads to a waiting chamber. We have a lot of those, that's where I'm usually stationed. They- uh, the King will usually have council meetings there, and they're usually empty so I can see why you'd think that it's a dead end. But there's doors in the walls that sort of blend in. You can get pretty much anywhere in the palace through those, because the King needs to go from place to place pretty quickly, especially during meetings." My mind throws back at his words, drowning my subconscious in memories.  

His gun muzzle to my nape. A death wish in my head. A hidden door in the wall. A plea for me for run away as far and fast as I could. 

"If you get into there," Marco continued, bringing me back to the present, "then you can go anywhere. I can take you guys there." 

Quiet.  

I came to really hate when Levi and Erwin were quiet after Marco said something. 

"Do you know where the vault is, Marco?" 

"Um...approximately. I was never allowed by the vault, so- I mean, I'm pretty sure it's between one of two floors." He wrung his hands together. "I can take you all to both, or if you want, I guess- I guess to save time, we can try to split up. One group goes to one floor, the other goes to the other."  _Split up?!_  

Erwin and Levi exchanged glances. (God, they always did this. Whenever someone said something slightly compromising, they'd turn and look at each other. What was that supposed to do. Why do people do that. You're supposed to talk it out, not just intensely stare it out until one of you speaks. Is this a deep relationship thing. Were they married or something. I don't understand people.)  

But somehow, they reached some sort of conclusion through staring at each other, and Erwin turned his head back to Marco with a nod. "Alright. There are two possibilities that can be done for groups. Either one of us-" He gestured to himself and Levi. "-takes one of you-" He gestured to me and Marco. "-so that each group is a lightning wielder with a non-modified human and they're more equally balanced, or Marco, you can go with Jean to create one group that has a higher percentage of achieving the goal and therefore increasing the chances of at least two of us reaching the Box."  

Marco and I exchanged glances. (Shut up.)  

We blinked at each other, and Marco visibly sucked in a breath and turned back to them. "...Can I be with Jean?" 

Erwin and Levi exchanged glances. (Are you kidding m-  _does anyone ever just fucking talk anymore._ ) 

Levi turned and gave the answer. 

* * *

"No, don't make a right. Make a left, and remember to crouch. There are probably patrols out right now, and I don't want them seeing you..." 

Marco spoke softly behind me, and his words buzzed in my ear from the communication device, followed by a response from Erwin that I wasn't paying enough attention to catch.  

The waiting chamber me and my boyfriend-thing crept through was empty and our footsteps bounced around the cold, hard marble back to us, ringing down our ears past the words from the communication devices. 

I waited with my back against a wall, arms crossed over my chest as I boredly picked at my thumbnail with my index finger. Marco was giving them directions, which I knew was important, but I didn't have anything to do in the meantime.  

"Yes. Right there. Okay, go ahead and start looking around. Tell me if you need anything or if you find it. Yes, you're welcome! Good luck!" Marco's fingers dropped from his ear and he turned around to smile at me, nodding. "Okay, they're in the right place. So it's time for you and me to look around." 

I tipped my head back against the wall and groaned. "Finally. That took forever." 

Marco let out something of a breathy chuckle and shook his head. "Ah, impatient as always, Jean. The important thing is they're on their way now, so we can go. Shall we?" Tilting his head and beaming, he turned and offered me his arm.  

I blinked at him. He was ridiculous. 

But I walked forward and linked arms with him, smiling in spite of myself. 

I considered our luck getting there. I remembered how there were exterior guards, genetically modified with superhuman strength, guarding the outside of the palace. It was good that we never ran into them, as we never would've stood a chance. ...I then considered how odd and really convenient actually was that we never had any encounter with them like we should have. Like, if this was some fictional story (which it should be, this'd make an  _amazing_  story) that'd probably be one of those little details the author was proud of but, since they never needed to be brought up again, became irrelevant and forgotten by the author because their memory is  _shit_.  

But I couldn't bring myself to complain, after all.  

Knowing where the doors were, Marco led me up along the vast room. "Just ahead," he chirped. 

I gave a hum of acknowledgement, then sucked in a breath and turned my head to him. "Hey, Marco." 

"Yes, Jean?" 

"So, I was thinki-"  

So. 

You know what's a horrible feeling? When you're walking with the guy you like with your arms linked and everything is just jolly and then some asshole appears in the doorway and try to electrocute you two. 

The first thing I was aware of after the great crack in my ears that turned my vision dull and deafened me was Marco screaming. I was on the ground, dazed, vaguely piecing together that shit, there was something bad here, there...there were...guua...rds? Guards. Attacking...attacking us. That...wasn't good. 

Head ringing and dazed as the world came in and out of focus with a hand clamped over my ear where lightning has struck it, I wobbily tried raising myself to my feet, until a fist came rocketing into my temple and pushed me back down on my ass (oh, so that's what that feels like).  

"You!" came a furious boom of a voice. "The li...nin...free...!" Lightning freak? I could barely open my mouth in what could be a response if I idealized the idea of a response before I was bowled over, my skull cracking against the tile. My eyes shot open and suddenly the world was clear enough for me to see that there was that douchehole Marlo with his knee in my chest and I let out a strangled yelp as his hand fisted in my hair and yanked with searingly painful force, like he was going to pull my scalp off my head. A stupid amount of adrenaline was suddenly rushing through my veins, just enough to let me shoot my hands up into his hair and pull his forehead as hard as I could into the floor next to me. His body lurched with my motion, giving just enough hesitation for me to plant one foot on the floor for leverage and push up to throw him off of me. But he was only temporarily hurt, not paralyzed- and his hands shot out around my wrists and I went into a panic.  

I clenched my fists, then suddenly threw myself to slam onto the ground with a spine-jolting thump. I gritted my teeth, knowing that once the adrenaline had exited my system and stopped numbing the pain and making me dumbly bold, my entire body would hurt like Satan was performing acupuncture on me with spearheads. But until then, I had to deal with this slimy pissdick. Rolling onto my back with his hold on me, he was pulled back with me. And in the crucial half-second where he was hovering above me mid-fall, I let lightning gather in my foot and kicked up the sparking heel of my boot square in his face.  

It kind of felt good. 

Once Marlo was skidding on his back away from me, hands covering his face as he howled in pain. Shakily, I wobbled to my feet, watching him writhe and trying not to think about how I knew I should've felt worse than I did.  

Marco was a little ways down from me, battling with some unfamiliar guard. But unlike his spar with Annie, this guard was not holding back.  

I blinked at him before calling out. "Oi, Marco!" 

"Ugh!" He ducked to avoid a punch, his voice wildly frantic and exasperated. " _What_ , Jean?!" 

It was then that I noticed that there wasn't one guard on Marco, but two, the other one smaller and previously blocked by the larger one's position. I figured it was a problem right then, but wow, it really became a problem when the smaller one lunged at me.  

She threw an enraged punch at my nose, which I swiftly dodged, eyes wide as I gulped. "So," I yelled out to Marco, lashing out an unfortunately missed kick at her stomach. "I was thinking." 

The guard Marco was against gathered lightning in his palms and thrust them out to Marco. Marco narrowly dodged by bending backwards and squeaking. "Can this wait?" 

I had kicked the guard flat on her back, and she went crazy trying to claw at me and roll us over. "Let's go on a date!" I let out a pained 'oof' as she kneed my stomach. 

"Wha- _date?_ " Marco cried, landing a kick in his guard's side. Atta boy. 

"Yeah! When we're done, date me!" She twisted her hips and threw her weight so that I went sailing off of her, grunting with pain. 

" _Date?_ " Marco shrieked again. Yes. Date. Me, him. Why was he having trouble with this? His guard socked him in the jaw, and Marco hissed, clutching at where he had been struck, quickly turning wild, slightly irritated eyes to me. "Why are you talking about this now?" 

"Well," I shouted in reply, tussling with my guard, who had leaped back on me. "It's what I was gonna ask you-" Dodged a punch. "-before these shitlords came to party." The guard scowled. I wheezed out a laugh at her expression, but shut up at the screamingly painful bolt of lightning in my left leg. "Ah! Ow!" 

"Yes, Jean!" he said back, his voice bouncing off a groan as he flipped backwards to avoid a kick (despite the pain, I swelled up with pride- I taught him that). "Of course I'll date you!"  

Irrationally under my circumstances, I grinned.  

Shooting a sparking hand out, I grabbed at my guard's face, twisting my wrist and shoving her off with newfound motivation. I socked her in the skull in just a way that, on the one stroke of luck in my life, she passed out, then set to trying to raise myself up and hobble on fucking over with one leg limp until the goddamn paralysis wore off.  

Marco was pinned down by his guard when I looked over. The guard had Marco's arms pressed down on either side of him to the ground, and their foreheads were together. 

What surprised me, though, was how completely and utterly Marco's earlier hesitation and fright was gone. His eyes were narrowed in pure and condensed fury, glinting with anything but mercy. His lip was curled back in a teeth-baring snarl, and his brows furrowed and fists curled.  

I know that it's inappropriate timing and subject matter, but he looked really hot.  

I blinked and shook my head, cupping my hands around my mouth, hollering at the top of my lungs. "Kick his ass, baby!"  

I couldn't be sure if that pull to his lips was a grin at my words or not, but his fist came sailing up to knock against the guard's temple, and he rolled off of him. Instantly Marco twisted around, trying to get on his knees to heave himself up to his feet, but just as he starting kicking himself up off the ground, the guard rolled over and reached up, wrapping a hand around Marco's ankle. With the sharp, sudden stopper on his movement mid-motion, Marco shrieked and sailed downwards face-first, his flailing arms not having enough time to catch himself when he collided with the floor. 

Instinctively, I gasped loudly, too stunned to form words and flinched forward. However, with my whole body in motion except itself, my temporarily useless left leg nearly made me tumble over myself.  

I caught myself right before the collision, snapping my head up with large eyes. "Marco!" I cried. The feeling was starting to return to my leg in hot, uncomfortable tingling, and I gritted my teeth and skidded my fingerpads across the floor in frustration with not yet being able to get back up. _Come on, come on, come on come on come on come-_  

Marco was panicking, thrashing about, trying to shake the guard off his leg. "Let go! Let go! Get off, g- g- guwah!" 

"Ah! Shit, you're- fucking-  _heav-!_ " 

"This hurts, Jea- ah! Faster! I take it back,  _fasterfasterfast-!_ " 

A while back, I said I was impulsive. Not an idiot, but impulsive. Act on instinct. So the very second I could move my leg again, I was moving on nothing but the thought of  _oh my god, I need to get Marco out of there._ So, nearly tripping over myself in the process, I sprinted up and hooked my arms under his, dragging him backwards away from the guard as fast as possible. Marco was basically squealing the whole time, and I was gritting my teeth as I tried dragging him back, an action of which friction was in wild protest of.  

The guard was rapidly scrabbling to his feet and I couldn't even see behind me where I was pulling him to. It was just wild bedlam because I had to get us out and I needed the guard to go away. He was coming after us, and I felt Marco tense in my arms. "Jean!" 

"I know, I know!" I yelled back, swallowing hard and clenching my right arm around him tighter as the guard rose to his feet,  _shitshitshit._ I snapped my left arm up, pushing myself backwards and falling back even further with the force of the lightning bolt I blinded shot at him in my panic.  

But the backwards force was a little too strong, and I had to take a step back. Only...there wasn't any ground underneath my foot. And with the momentum I already had, all I could do was scream as I fell backwards, taking Marco with me. 

The momentary panic I felt was indescribable. All I knew is that I was falling and I couldn't see where I was falling and I had no idea how long I was going to be falling.  

My back hit water.  

The next thing I knew, I was submerged in cold water, flailing and thrashing to no avail other then stirring up bubbles and twirling myself uselessly in the drink. I couldn't swim,  _I couldn't swim_ and I couldn't see anything because it was dark, and I had let go of Marco and I would've screamed if water didn't fill my mouth as soon as it opened and there was a hand wrapping around my wrist yanking me up, and I was jerked upwards through the water and- 

And then my head broke the surface, and I was hunching out of the water, palms flat on the ground as I tried to wobbily support myself, still in the water from my hips down as I hacked and coughed it out of my lungs. 

Heavy, ragged breathing matching my own was right beside me. "...Sorry," came a soft voice. "As a guard, I thought the water trenches were a great idea. They're very effective at stopping intruders. But I guess...they're really not that good when you're the intruder." 

I groaned and tapped my forehead to the floor. "No." 

Marco and I were both half-inside the rectangular trenches filled with water that cut down into the floor I didn't know how deep, clutching onto the wall the floor made to alleviate treading water. Damn, I fell into one of these the first time I was there. I should've kept that in mind.  

I tiredly raised my head. The guard who we were against was laying back first on the floor, seemingly out cold. Oh, good. I didn't know there were any spots you could hit someone with lightning that could knock them out. Guess it was a lucky find. 

I scrunched up my face and tilted my head to the side, knocking the heel of my hand to my opposite temple to try to get the water out of my ear. I repeated the action to the other side, then blinked at the tiny  _clink_ of something hard hitting the floor. 

Oh. The small, circular, black communication device that had been nestled against my antitragus. I forgot about that. 

I grimaced and heaved myself out of the water, sitting on the floor and picking up the communication device, holding it in-between my thumb and index finger and frowning at it as I tried to distract myself from how uncomfortable and cold I was now. "It's busted now," I said with a sigh.  

Marco blinked at me, still half in the water, not seeming to mind as much as me. "Really? Why?" 

"Water and electronics don't go together." 

"...How do you know?" 

I quirked an eyebrow at him. "I'm an electrician." I paused, then furrowed my brows. "Okay, ex-electrician, whatever. Anyway, I know how this shit works. And...doesn't work." I sighed down at the tiny, waterlogged device, and stuck it into a sopping wet denim pocket of my jeans. I surveyed the guards by glancing over my shoulder. All three were unmoving. Good. I looked back forward to Marco, still _...still_ half in the water, blinking up at me. I frowned. "Are you gonna get out or. Are you comfortable in there." 

"Huh? Oh. Yeah. Right. Sorry. I don't mind the water, it's kind of nice. I haven't bathed in a while." 

"You like to swim?" 

"...I. I guess." 

"Ha. As a guard, you'd stand behind these things all day, right? You were the palace pool boy." 

His eyebrow quirked up, then he grinned. And then I screeched as he pushed himself up, fisted his hand in the hem of my shirt, and yanked me in. 

I was falling back into the water, but this time, Marco was holding onto me. And as we twirled down in the water, spinning and lacing hands. Our clothes fanned out and floated around us. The water was cold, but he was warm as our lips pressed together. 

It was messy and awkward, as it was hard to kiss without letting water flood our mouths. But nonetheless, our fingers twisted in each other's hair as our lips melded softly, working gently against each other. Our eyes were closed and we clung to each other, weightless and careless, as the world spun madly around us.  

It was a while before we came back up. I didn't know I could hold my breath that long, let alone tread water for that long. But when at last our heads broke the surface, I gasped in a wheezing breath and shook my head, droplets flying off in every direction. Marco was smiling next to me and ran a gloved hand through his hair, pushing his soaked black locks back, which was a gorgeous look for him. I heaved myself out of the water, palms flat against the floor, and shook myself off, inwardly grumbling about what the water was gonna do to my leather jacket. I stood up, shivering as the air hit my soaked skin and made my clothes cling tight around my flesh. My dogtags jingled as I messily ran a hand through my dampened, clumped hair, then turned to see Marco get out of the water too. 

I've described his outfit before- you know, cream felt jacket, ivory undershirt, dark brown cloth scarf, fitted black jeans and black gloves- so you should already kind of get the idea that he looked  _wicked hot_ , but I don't know if you truly comprehend how much Adonis himself was sobbing over how deliciously beautiful he looked climbing out of the water.  

Being damp, his clothes were even tighter than usual, the water dripping down his chest and down the V of his hips. His light-colored shirt had gone just see-through enough to drive me crazy. His hair was smoothed back and his eyes glittered playfully and- 

Basically, don't go into extraordinarily lethal areas full of people trying to kill you  with a really really attractive mission partner unless you want to be saying "Down boy!" so many times you could be training a dog. 

"U-uh," I stuttered dumbly. "We. We, uh. Yeah." I made hand gestures to somewhere behind me, not turning to look because I was far too distracted by the drops rolling down the outline of his now clearly visible abs.  

Marco frowned and followed my gaze down at his hipbones, brushing his hand there, figuring that there was some dirt or something of the sort that I was staring at. Oh, sure, yeah. I'd let him believe that. I cough and looked back up at him, trying not to stare and tucking my hands behind my back and clearing my throat. Marco smiled cheerfully and mirrored my action. "I hope Levi and Erwin are doing alright...but we should get on getting the Box, too." I nodded. "So." He jabbed a thumb behind us. "The door will be there, behind the trenches. Don't worry, we can walk around them. And then once we're in, I should be able to navigate us from there." 

"Are there going to be guards in there?" 

"Probably not. We-.  _They_  never just stand around inside the inner staircases, they're never stationed there. If you just follow me, I think we'll be okay." He turned around and started in a path along the edges of the trench. I trailed behind him, clutching onto his hand.  

I glanced back over at the three guards lying on their backs, unmoving. Two I knew for sure were knocked out. But the third one...I considered how I hit him with lightning, which causes temporary paralysis to those who can also bend lightning. Not for them to knock out. 

My throat went dry as I tried so hard to not think about the possibility of him not being knocked out at all. The possibility that he wasn't moving because...because he was- 

No.  

I couldn't afford to entertain that possibility.  

 _Eyes forward, Kirschtein._  

 _Eyes forward._  

* * *

I could give you the full rundown. I could tell you how difficult it was to navigate, how we had to fight against guards and run. How Marco was almost in tears fighting against some of them, how I had to hold his hand more than he held mine at parts. Basically, the whole detailed story of just how fucking unimaginably difficult finding the goddamn vault actually was. 

But that's long, and I don't like really talking about it either, so I'm just going to skip ahead to when we did actually find it.  

Which I hate taking about even more. 

So the vault was in this really highly guarded area, as you might expect. And the fights with them were exhausting- Marco and I had gotten good at fighting them off by now, but it still took a lot out of us.  

So after taking out the ten or so guards in front of this one door which was obviously goal destination, we swung it open and hurried inside. And there, behind the door, was...another wall. 

It was a special wall, though.  

In the middle was a bigass, silver plated door, polished to a shine. On on either side of the door, two small keypads with numbers 1-9 on them. I gawked at it, brows furrowed and mouth agape, before turning my head to Marco. "What the hell is this." 

He sucked in a breath and puffed out his cheeks. "Vault entrance. I mean, I'm pretty sure. And, look." He gestured at the keypads. "It's just like Nile said." 

Oh. Right. I had almost forgotten about him. I gritted my teeth. "Don't really wanna take advice from the guy who killed my dad." 

Marco sighed. "Jean, we've been over this. It was an order and it's not fair to hold it against him, as it wasn't something he would've done on his own free will." 

"That's no excuse," I grumbled. 

"I know," came his soft, gentle voice, his words surprising me. "What the guards have done is inexcusable, and even I won't try to justify what actions I've taken in the past among them. I'm not excusing Nile, I'm just giving you the reason. But." He reached over to grab my hand, smiling and squeezing lightly. "I do truly believe he was trying to help. He's given us the code. And honestly, I think it's the truth- after all, he had nothing to lose, and maybe he hoped that we could continue what he failed at, right? He's always been a little rough around the edges but I always thought he had better intentions at heart. And even if he is lying, then either we take a chance with his lie or fail completely. It's worth a shot, isn't it? The Box is worth it...isn't it?" 

I don't know, I replied, yet I did not say a word.  

His little speech made me well up with a myriad of several emotions. Uncertainty, hope, and horrid, horrid guilt for ever even beginning to doubt that he was anything but on my side.  

"Shit, Marco," I breathed, shaking my head and lacing my fingers with his. I sucked in a lungful of air, then closed my eyes in recollection. "...Left keypad," I recited, picturing Nile pinned beneath me as he spat out the entry code. "1-0-4-5-7." 

"I'll type it in," he said quietly. I opened my eyes and quirked an eyebrow at him, and he shrugged and held up his free hand. "Gloves." 

"Ah," I said, letting go of his hand to cross my wrists behind my back and nod. Marco nodded and walked over, nervously fidgeting as he punched in the code. 

 _Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep._  A pause.  _Beep._  

And then, all of a sudden, the floor opened up beneath us, and I was screaming as me and Marco fell down, down, down, wrong code, wrong code, and I could barely even scream as we tumbled into darkness and I thought we were going to fall forever until I saw the flames below us- 

Heheheh, nah, I'm messing with you. 

The door opened. 

It lifted up vertically, retracting into the frame. I squinted as suddenly I was slammed with harshly bright light spilling from the doorway, gritting my teeth and covering my eyes with my forearm. I heard Marco gasp and, clenching my teeth, cracked open an eye. 

I'm...I'm not entirely sure what I was expecting. I guess I wasn't expecting the Box to be so literally a box. 

A great room was revealed, completely white, from the floor, walls and ceiling. And in the middle of this otherwise empty and unnecessarily large chamber was a silver stand swooping up from the floor, with a round and flat top to it like a stylistic bedside table. And on top of the surface of it was a small and shockingly plain cube, white in color with black corners, only about the size of my head. 

"...That's the Box?" I whispered, squinting. 

"I-I guess so," replied Marco in a hushed tone, sounding as dumbfounded as me. 

"That's...this is really underwhelming." 

"What were you expecting?" 

"Something more overwhelming." 

"Me too, I guess...what do you think it does?" 

"Hell if I know," I muttered, then pointed at it. "But if that shrimpy gift box is somehow the most powerful thing in the world, then let's just grab it and get out of here." 

Marco pursed his lips and nodded, and stepped into the room. I followed suit. Our footsteps lightly echoed against the plastic-like floor. We came to a stop in front of the Box, swallowing hard and staring down at it. 

I couldn't believe it. My entire childhood was full of stories about this, I almost died for this, my dad died for... _this._  Pandora's Box was finally just beneath my fingertips, and I could only pray I was doing the right thing. 

Marco and I swapped gazes, and I breathed in deeply, lungs tapping my ribs as they swelled and I reached a shaky hand out down towards it. 

As soon as my fingertips brushed the cold surface of the tiny and supposedly omnipotent instrument, I drew it back and shrilly gasped as something sprung from it, something in a glowing streak of movement,  _fuck-_  

 _-..._ what the fuck? 

The Box let out a tiny beeping noise, and from it suddenly came some sort...lighted display levitating in front of us. It was large and square, and I realized that the Box was  _projecting_ it into the air. 

"What did you-?" Marco began to stutter, but trailed off as more details filled the golden-lined projection. 

There were two selection bars amidst a darkened yellow background. ' **Wall Maria Statistics and Status** ' read the top one, and ' **Wall Rose Statistics and Status** ' read the second one beneath it. I gawked, having never seen anything like it before in my life. "What the hell...?" I asked softly, more to myself than Marco.  

Something transfixed me. Curiosity, I guess, and lack of common sense, but all of a sudden, I  _had_ to know what this thing did. What did it mean by 'Statistics and Status'? I walked forward a couple feet to stand directly in front of the large projection, and on some crazy whim, tapped the air over where the 'Wall Rose Statistics and Status' was projected. 

God knows how it read my movements, but it seemed to recognize my touch, and flicked to another screen.   

With another small  _beep,_ the screen changed to a page titled ' **Population Control** - _Wall Rose_ ' from the upper left corner. The page was filled with outlined boxes, each filled with it's own bar of information, and I scanned them down.  

' **Pathogens in Area:** 1,476' read the top box, with an option of ' **Adjust?** ' beneath it. ' **Lethality Rate of Pathogens:** 55%' read the one underneath it, with the same option of ' **Adjust?** ' just below. Other similar entries filled the page; ' **Unemployment Rate:** 79%'. ' **Population:** 33,454'. ' **Jailed Population:** 4,785'. ' **Economic Reliance:** High', each with that fucking ' **Adjust?** ' option underneath, and a ' **View Cameras?** ' bar was in the bottom right corner. 

My eyes widened in horror, and my hand flew to my mouth at the horrible realization I was able to gather from even just these few bits of information.  

The Box had always been recounted to me as the all-powerful, high technology tool used to keep the King in power. What I had never realized is that the Box was a control center, surveying us- and that filthy bastard on the throne used it to literally control our lives.  

I shook my head, trembling as my eyes flicked over the page. "This...this is sick," I whispered. "This is- this is  _disgusting-"_  

"Oh my god," said Marco beside me, his voice distant and cracking. "He controls-? He can even control the pathogens in-? This is so twisted..." 

Marco had asked once why Rose was so much dirtier and poverty-stricken than Sina, and I replied that I didn't know.  

It was because there was a disgusting pig with a crown releasing diseases into the area to kill us. A disgusting pig shutting down businesses to keep us in horrid unemployment. A disgusting pig leaving his own people with nothing just to keep them economically dependent on Sina.  

But before I had the chance to yell, there was another  _beep_ and in front of the transparent yellow screen displaying Rose's statistics came a smaller, light blue screen.  

' **Wall Sina Statistics and Status** ', read the single selection bar on the screen.  

My head whipped around to Marco, who was staring at the Box with his arms tucked in and hands palm up on either side of his chest and frantically shaking his head in a 'I didn't mean to!' gesture. I glanced down at the Box. It had  _opened up._  

The sides of the Box had folded down, yet nothing seemed to be inside yet odd bright light. I stared at it, then gawked at Marco. "What the fuck did you  _do?_ " 

"I don't know!" he squeaked. "I just- I just touched the sides, a-and it opened up, and then the Sina statistics page came up-! I didn't mean to!" 

I breathed out, swallowing hard and him and looking forward. I sucked in a breath and tapped the selection bar. 

' **Population Control -** _Wall Sina_ '.  

' **Birth Rate:** 67%'. ' **Literacy Rate:** 98%'. ' **Unemployment Rate:** 9%'. ' **Population:** 54,099'. ' **Jailed Population:** 3%'. ' **Economical Sustainability:** High'. ' **View Cameras?** ' 

Pandora's Box. 

Pandora was given a box from Zeus on the condition that she'd never open it or it'd throw the world into chaos. When it was open, all the horrors imaginable were released into the world- among them sickness, death, and poverty.  

Yet what remained inside the box was one thing- hope. 

This sickening instrument below me was aptly named. It released sickness, death, and poverty upon the land, yet inside it was hope. 

Hope for  _them._  

My anger was unlike anything I had ever felt before, burning the insides of my veins and making my vision blur and tint red. And before I knew what I was doing, I was screaming and my fist came knocking into the side of the Box, wanting it to fall onto the ground and break into a million pieces and to set fire to the smashed remains.  

It fell in slow motion. It left the top of the table in a nearly graceful movement, spinning as it made it's descent.  

But just before it hit the ground, there was a flash of ivory and a shriek, and gloved hands were reaching out and wrapped around it just before it made contact.  

When time resumed it's regular tempo, I took a step back as Marco was diving down to catch the Box, his stomach skidding across the floor with his hands holding the Box outstretched in front of him. My eyes were huge as I stared at him and he winced.  

"What the hell, Marco?" I barked. "Break it!" 

He flipped around on his back, holding it tightly to his chest and looking at me pleadingly. "Think about this, Jean! If we use it for good, we'll be able to adjust all these and put the walls in balance! If we break it, who knows what might happen? It might stay like this forever!" 

I growled and opened my mouth, but I was jumping at sudden loud, blaring alarms ripping through the air. I slammed my hands over my ears and my face pinched in discomfort at the grating noise. Marco did the same and whimpered. 

"Those alarms are probably for taking the Box off its stand!" he yelled over the sound.  _Great. I fucked everything up. Again._ "We have to get out of here before more guards show up!"  

I didn't have time to argue or strategize. I just nodded, hoisted him to his feet, and we took off sprinting.  

"We have to find Levi and Erwin!" I yelled at him as we ran out of the room, out of the outer door back into the hallway. He nodded and clutched the Box to his chest.  

Marco navigated us back the way we came, and the sound of footsteps somewhere behind us only made us go faster. 

My heart rammed in my chest from the sheer terror of the situation, and I was running on pure adrenaline. We stormed up the stairs, edged on by knowing that behind us were people running as fast as they could to try to kill us. "Come on!" Marco said, his voice fast and shaky as he suddenly halted and turned out into a doorway.  

I followed, and we were spat into the chamber we had fallen into the water of. And from the other side of the room, running in from the doorway there, was a short man with his coat flaring out behind him and his taller, strong-jawed and blonde companion. 

"Levi! Erwin!" I called. "What are you guys-?" 

"We heard the alarms," blurted Levi. "Figured something went fuck, then figured you two would be back here." 

"Do you have it?" asked Erwin as he quickly approached us. "Do you have the Box?" 

Still running beside me, Marco wheezed out, "Yeah!" and jerked his chin down at the cube held to his ribs. 

Once we were close, Levi held out his arms. "Let me hold it." 

"Bu-" 

"Let me hold it!" he snapped impatiently, although I couldn't blame him. Time was killer short. Marco gulped and handed it over.  

I couldn't describe Levi's expression to you, because my head was whipping around, and I yelled at the sight of the first flashes of silver appearing in the doorway. "Guards!" I shrieked, taking off running again.  

The others followed, which I could tell by heavy footsteps and ragged panting right behind me. Able to find my way out from here, I ran out the door, the hung a sharp right to the covered entrance to the watch tower tunnel and prepared to jump in. 

But being the first one to arrive, I tossed a glance over my shoulder to make sure my three heist partners were on their way as well. Levi and Erwin were almost to where I was, yet Marco trailed behind.  

The group of guards were advancing rapidly. The one in front raised his hand and released a bolt of lightning, and I all but screamed as I saw it hit Marco's spine, and suddenly, he collapsed.  

"Marco!" I screeched, flinching forward, but suddenly, Erwin's strong hand was closing around my bicep and he yanked me up and forward, into the entrance of the tunnel. 

"Wait!" I yelled, trying to kick my feet into the ground for resistance as he pulled me through, his strength too great for me to break from his grip myself. My eyes were wild with panic and I craned my head around as I was being forcefully pulled forward. The guards swarmed Marco in a silver huddle, and I was screaming and squirming. "Wait, Marco's back there!" 

"We have to go, Jean," murmured Erwin, not so much as even glancing behind him. 

The scene inside the palace was growing smaller and smaller as he pulled me further and further away, and I was going hysterical, trying to yank myself away from him. "Let me go! Let me go! We need to get Marco! We can't leave him!" 

Levi, running in front of us, tossed a glare back at me, something cold glittering in his eyes that sent chills down my spine. "He's a guard," he snarled. "The same people who took so much from us and killed your father. I have utter disgust for them. He's where he belongs." 

"He changed!" I yelled, craze and desperation dripping off every syllable. "He's not one of them! We have to go back there and get him,  _listen to me,_ we can't just-!" 

But a hand came to clamp over my mouth, and then a wet cloth was held to my nose, a nose-wrinkling scent enveloping my senses. 

But I breathed in the chemical, as it couldn't have been helped in my hyperventilation.  

And it was the last thing I remember before my eyes rolled back in my head, my knees buckled, and the world faded to black.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> the big reveal- a.k.a. THE SCENE IVE BEEN WAITING TO WRITE SINCE THIS DANG STORY BEGAN- at last.
> 
> as always, hope you enjoyed it, feedback is WOOONDERFUL, and my tumblr is [here](http://yunishinoya.co.vu/).


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